#and at the end of it all: having to walk away. again. alone. | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

bejeweledinterludes · 2 days ago

Text

givin’ it all.

OR touch starved ! dean, part 2. you ask, i answer <3

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read part 1 here!

「 pairing 」 : touch starved ! dean x fem ! reader

「 word count 」 : 5.9k

「 content / warnings 」 : late seasons sad n soft!dean, vulnerability to da max (again), emotions, emotions, EMOTIONS, past trauma, confessions?

you have one ( 1 ) new message from the author ! ↓

surprise! here is a lovely part 2 for the people that asked and in honor of my bday month starting! BUTTTT most importantly, this is a thank you for 600+ followers !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i hope all of you know that i appreciate every single one of you that enjoys and interacts with my writing! it means the world, truly. once again, thank you all so much for the continued and ongoing support + love! i hope you all enjoy this one! and special thanks to @emeraldcrs + @maddie0101 (even though i ended up not doing what i said i was going to LMFAO <3)

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dean’s touch problem was getting out of hand.

ever since that night in your bedroom, he’s wished he could be there again, laying next to you every night— he’d even actually got the courage to get out of his bed one night when he couldn’t sleep to go to your room, but he never knocked on your door.

he did, however, sit down next to it in the hallway until he got tired enough that he had to fight to keep his eyes open, then went back to his own room.

you hadn’t even treated him any differently, either. you had still smiled at him when he walked into the kitchen that morning when you were already sitting with sam, like you always did— and you hadn’t said a word about the night before, when you held him like he’d always wanted to be held.

and god, did he want more.

dean wanted everything, actually. anything you had to offer. he’d take a squeeze on his shoulder, a ruffle of his hair— but hell, you did that pretty regularly already. and who was he to just ask for more?

dean winchester did not ask for things. he wasn’t allowed. he’s done just fine up until now without the touch of another human being, so why couldn’t the ache in his chest go away after your fingers left his skin? after that night?

it felt pathetic, wanting to need it. and to make matters worse, dean wanted all of you. it was selfish. you didn’t deserve someone like him, he knew it. but then again, you never flirted with anyone at the bars, ever. even when you all first started hunting together. and when he’d asked you about it (not so casually), you shrugged and told him the truth, because you always did— that as crazy and stupid as it sounded, you’d wanted something, someone real.

and dean?

he wanted to be the one to give that to you.

that’s when he knew he was in trouble.

because of too many things, really— what if you died, again? what if he died, again? and what happens when you ultimately rejected him, because if dean winchester was anything, it was unloveable.

but charlie said she loved him. sam told him once in a while, too— and you’d said it the first time you ‘died’, then came back. he never brought that up. neither did you. but he just wanted to hear you say it again.

so he could say it back this time.

dean hated the way he felt when the people he loved actually showed him that they maybe cared about him, too— like the way a person feels when an entire room is singing ‘happy birthday’ to them and they don’t know what to do with themselves.

and yet, time and time again, dean found himself desperate for it. and he didn’t even know what ‘it’ was half the time.

but being around you when he felt like that helped. a lot.

dean didn’t know what it was, or when it even started, but he always gravitated towards you. always had to be around you, be near you. and you never once pointed it out. you just let him into your space, your bubble, even your hobbies— and sometimes, doing literally nothing at all.

it was one of the reasons dean loved you. yeah, yeah, he said it, whatever. leave him alone. it seemed like any time you were near, he was more relaxed. not fully, of course— but his shoulders felt less tight and his jaw wasn’t sore from clenching it so hard.

he breathed easier. without realizing it, you helped dean take his mind off things (but of course you damn well knew that. why else would you have invited him to go to the post office with you?).

and he craved it.

if dean got captured by a jinn right now, you’d be there. you’re all he’s wanted. you, maybe a house— screw anything else, honestly. if you were there, so was he. but he’d definitely prefer you sitting on the hood of baby— yeah, his two girls. that was a little strange analogy though, because he’s thought about fucking you right on top of baby. or inside, on the seats. maybe even under—?

this djinn-fantasy thing was starting to sound a lot like just a sex dream.

wouldn’t be the first time dean had one about you, though.

besides. you were all he dreamed about, anyway.

but this night, he was wishing he had a dream like that. no. tonight, he was having yet another goddamn nightmare.

the barely-lit light on dean’s desk (he says he ‘accidentally’ leaves it on once in a while, but he really uses it as a makeshift night light. don’t tell anyone i told you that) cast soft dim glow on the concrete walls of his bedroom. the room was quiet, except for the occasional hum of machinery coming from somewhere in the bunker.

yet dean's mind? anything but peaceful. images, smells, sounds, and memories were piercing his mind— hell, purgatory, failed hunts, you name it. and the faces of people he’d lost, people he’d tortured were clear as day— the pain, the hurt, it was all there, as usual; but ten times worse tonight, it seemed. screams, snarls, gunshots, and his father’s voice echoed off of the traumas he was reliving.

he doesn’t know when his eyes had snapped open. but now dean was sitting up pin-straight in his bed, his breathing more like choppy gasps as he held and pointed his gun at— nothing. and his throat hurt, why did his throat hurt—?

oh.

it wasn’t just screams of other people.

it was his own this time. dean had screamed out loud.

a few rooms away, you were also jolted awake by dean's scream. it was so loud that it had even carried through the thick concrete walls of the bunker that were separating you both. you shot up from your bed, years of instincts kicking in and legs moving before your sleepy mind could catch up— or think twice.

because the only thing that was going through your freshly-awoken mind?

the absolute worst.

you made it to dean’s door in record time, swinging it wide open with your own gun at the ready to fight something— but the sight you were met with was not the one you had been expecting.

at all.

dean was still sitting up straight, but now barely-relaxed, rapidly blinking his eyes with his trembling hand still holding his gun, adjusting to the still-dim but brighter light flooding his room, to feeling damp in his clothes instead of all bloody and broken, to the echoes of screams being replaced with the white noise of the bunker–

and to… you.

yeah, you. standing in his doorway, hand on the edge of his door (you’d caught it as it bounced back from you essentially tearing it open), your own gun now at your side instead of drawn. your hair was all messy, clothes a little bunched up in places, breathing a little unevenly, yet not as much as him— but you still looked breathtaking, nightmare aside.

dean didn’t know what the hell kind of water you were drinking to make you look like that. even being freshy pulled from sleep like him, you looked beautiful. pretty, gorgeous, stunning? dean couldn’t find a word, and he doesn’t think he ever will.

and him.

oh, him.

dean always looked good— to the point where it bordered on you wanting to rip your hair out, most days. and despite what de’d just gone through, he still looked good. kidding aside, you craved the times you were able to see him like this more than you cared to admit to yourself.

not because he was in pain, or suffering the traumas of his less-than-peaceful life— but because it reminded you that even dean, for as everything that he was: a hero, larger than life, better than any hunter, still had moments like… this. when the memories became real life again. when the thoughts and his past actions echoed in his mind like taunts.

when you saw him like this: sweat all over, hair sticking up, eyes like they didn’t know what was real, you saw a piece of dean that few— or none at all had seen. most times, it felt like you were intruding on something private, sacred. and every realistically-thinking cell in your body screamed that you shouldn’t be here, seeing this. seeing dean.

but that little voice in your head just wouldn’t listen.

it never did. not when it told you that maybe dean didn’t touch you like he did everyone else— because hell.

he never touched anyone else. only you.

he’d do it all the time, so frequently and without a word that you weren’t sure he was aware he was actually doing it. dean sat so close to you what seemed like 24/7, like a magnet. in a booth, at a bar, wherever. you’d gotten so used to it, it had been unusual not to have the solid warmth of dean next to you when you’d gone off on your own to interview witnesses on a case.

and you would catch him playing with your hair on more than one occasion. and while dean got all embarrassed, you just smiled a little, then went back to reading the old-ass book you’d been poured over (but not without first nonchalantly adjusting yourself so he got more access to your hair).

dean would never forget it.

because that’s who you were, essentially. taking all the pieces of him in tow with you. all the dirty, messed up, strewn-about shards of him, scattered like a discarded shattered vase on the floor— and just accepting it.

and you never tried to ‘fix’ him, but in some way, you still somehow were. without really ever talking about it, or maybe even knowing. but when those times that only occurred on a rare occasion that dean would talk, the words spilling out and overflowing— but you never judged him. only listened. spoke when it was needed from you.

it meant everything.

and more.

dean would hug you almost every five minutes when he was too drunk to stand straight, you had learned one night early on in your friendship. when his ‘hey, maybe we shouldn’t do that’ voice in his head was silenced, he was kinda (a lot) all over you. because yes, he was much touchier when he was drunk, especially around you.

even now, after years since it happened, you still remembered the way his broad, loose frame had crumpled against you— and you caught him.

just like now.

you’d snapped over whatever the hell just came over you— and you weren’t sure how long you’d been standing there, but you hoped it wasn’t as long as you thought it to be, then slowly shut dean’s door behind you with a click, enveloping you both in the dim light this time.

because no way in any world were you about to leave dean alone after seeing him like this.

you pad across his room like you’d done a million times before— but never in this way. this late in the night? sure, but not like now.

you weren’t really thinking. because let’s be honest here: for every critical and rational thought you had, dean seemed to just… make them all disappear from your mind.

not in the survival sense, but in the ‘really, what’s stopping me from just kissing him’ viewpoint. so much so that you had to literally force yourself to not do anything. to not cross that line. you weren’t sure if he even knew that he was aware he was doing it to you, yet it still happened. a lot.

but back to now. back to dean’s room, to the light being returned to normal, and dean’s wondering why the hell is it so cold? he was still just a complete mess, his frayed and raw nerves only being held together by skin, blood and bones. he shut his eyes and kept them like that, trying to banish the memories from his mind, to just snap the hell out of it. he could hear this ringing in his ears, and it was so loud, he just wanted it to stop—

and suddenly, it did.

dean didn’t even realize you’d started holding him until the scent of you finally flooded his senses. until he felt how warm you were. until he felt your hair on the side of his face. until he felt and heard your breathing.

during the aftermath, you’d somehow managed to gently pry dean’s gun out of his hand, setting yours and his on his desk before you’d gotten on his bed and sat with him, hugged him.

when his eyes finally opened, just for a split-second— the only sight he was met with wasn’t the pit, or purgatory, just the guns. the metal had glinted off of his desk light, his vision only slightly impaired by your hair.

your hair. why did it smell so good. and why was it so soft. the world may never know, dean thinks. well, he does know. you’d told him one night while putting something in your hair, and he had been walking past the doorway. he’d teased you about your ‘girly stuff’, but you didn’t even bat an eye.

that was another thing he’d noticed about you. you didn’t change yourself based on other’s opinions. you were secure in who you were, and didn’t need approval from anyone else to feel your best. it was one of the things dean wished he could do for real and not just as a front, as a defense.

you were confident, but you still asked him once in a while if you looked okay, more so in the most recent years.

and dean could never lie to you. he always said “‘course y’do”.

but that night, you’d shrugged, then just told him about whatever the hell you were putting on your head, explaining it in a way he’d understand if he’d been listening— but dean had been a little to focused on your lips moving and not enough on the words actually coming out of them.

dean found himself burying his face into your hair now, half into your neck and chest, his breath coming out uneven and in short pants against your skin. he allowed his eyes to flutter shut again as he just let himself sink into you, resting his head on your shoulder, arms finding your waist. he felt the adrenaline wearing off, but his heart was still pounding in his chest, and he felt his shoulders trembling. his mind was starting to adjust, but he felt like he’d just gotten off a treadmill after running on it too fast.

and dean felt so weak. even more so now than he ever had. a shell of himself, a whole grown-ass man crumpled into you like he was a little kid again, scared of the dark.

if his dad could see him now.

if sam saw him right now. oh, sam would finally see that his brother wasn’t the tower of light, safety he’d always viewed him as. he’d treat him differently, for sure. dean was no longer the protector, the one who watched over everyone and everything. too much had happened to sam, to the people he loved for that to be even a fraction of true anymore.

what was true, though?

dean was a failure.

in every sense of the word. he’d failed innocent people, family, friends— everyone more times than he could count.

but his mind remembered.

and it reminded him every night.

dean used to have the sense that he was at least doing something right, but as of late, everything he’d done so far was nothing short of one disappointment after the other. it was pitiful, really— he was a freakin’ hunter, for god’s sakes. you’d think he’d get a goddamn win once in a while. but not for a long time, it seemed.

and this was just yet another failure, another thing he absolutely sucked at. dean couldn’t even get back to normal after a nightmare without someone being there to hold him. it was pathetic, humiliating— but he couldn’t bring himself to let go of you.

somehow, that was his breaking point. the last straw.

dean finally just… broke.

you didn’t even realize what was happening until you heard the smallest strangled, trapped noise came out from the man you were essentially holding together, muffled against you— but you still heard it.

all it took for dean winchester to cry these days?

a hug, apparently.

the tears had been welling up in dean’s eyes faster than he could will them away— and he just couldn’t do it anymore. couldn’t put up the front he’d always been able to. he tried, god he tried so hard, but he was still shaking, for christ’s sakes— and he’d just woken up.

the more dean thought about it, the more your arms seemed like a good place to finally let it all out. you’d always treated him with kindness he didn’t deserve, so he just prayed that you wouldn’t push him away. that you would just let him have this. he doesn't think he could handle you rejecting him in this way right now.

and when you hear a slight sniff against you, you almost couldn’t believe it. dean didn’t cry. he got angry, upset, went non-verbal– but the one thing you hadn’t seen him do (at least in front of you) in all the years you’d known him, is cry.

but you weren’t leaving.

no, you just held him tighter, adjusting your grip and the way you were sitting so dean was more comfortable. you didn’t lay down, but you pulled him closer to you, running a hand up and down his back.

it’s not like you could say anything. what the hell could you say?

well.

one thing did come to mind.

so with your hand still gently rubbing dean’s back, you moved your head just a fraction so it could rest on his, whispering close to his ear.

“i got you.”

and that was it.

dean’s eyes screwed further shut, lip wobbling as he gripped way harder onto you, like you were the only lifeboat left in a choppy sea. like you were going to keep him here, like he’d suddenly fall apart, die if he let go.

and he let go—

figuratively.

you’d never heard a sob come out of dean before, but that night, you decided you never wanted to hear it after this. because it was physically hurting you to hear dean right now.

but you didn’t dare let him go. you held dean in your arms, still running a hand on his back, and he cried into your chest like he was four years old again, his entire body trembling against yours with the force of how much his sobs were wracking through his form.

this wasn’t just about dean’s nightmare. this was everything. the decades of holding things in, pushing them down, then moving on without ever unpacking it— it was all bursting through the floodgates, roaring in his ears, his senses.

broken sounds left his throat, almost choking on them. they were coming straight from the place dean dared not to ever touch in his heart. but he didn’t care how loud he was anymore, or how embarrassing this must be, how humiliating—

because you said that you had him.

and you wanted nothing more than to take every ounce, every inch of pain, heartbreak, suffering, and loss that made up the man you loved away from him so he didn’t have to deal with it.

dean didn’t deserve any of it. he deserved to be normal.

to have a life.

and damn you wanted to give that to him, so badly.

but for now, you’d just hold him. give him a place to rest. to let everything go.

to be the solace he needed, he deserved.

neither you or dean knew how long he’d stayed like that, but you both didn’t say a word the entire time you held him— the only sounds that filled his room were his less-than-quiet sobs (god he hoped sam hadn’t made it home from elieen’s yet) and the faint rustle of his sheets.

but at some point, with a final sniff, dean lifted his head from your shoulder, but didn’t meet your eyes. couldn’t.

he was so ashamed of himself, his actions. it didn’t matter that you guys had been friends however long, this was not supposed to be the side of him you saw. he’d seen you comfort dozens, maybe even hundreds of crying people on cases— because of lost loved ones, or because they had seen something too scary.

dean just never thought he’d be one of them.

you didn’t say anything at first. dean, eyes and face still wet with tears, was looking down between you both, eyes fixed on your pyjama pants’ pattern. he was avoiding the obvious, the pill he had to swallow. he’d just cried like a baby into you.

he could see the wetness on your shirt from the corner of his eye, but he dared not look up all the way. god, this was humiliating. you’d probably move out of the bunker after this.

because no way does dean come back from a stunt like he just pulled. staying in your bed is one thing, but the fact that he just broke down in front of you? you’d never see him the same, never look at him the same– and even if there was any chance of it before, no way in hell were you ever going to look at him in the way he wanted you to look at him.

he’d messed up big-time— again. the only thing he swore to never ruin, to never take away from himself, it all just unraveled because he was a goddamn crybaby. an idiot. why did he do that? just let himself? was he seriously that braindead that he couldn’t—

dean’s pulled out of the spiral of thoughts he’d conjured up for himself when he feels a hand under his jaw.

your hand.

dean’s breath was all out of whack, courtesy of crying— but his next inhale literally gets stuck somewhere when your free hand uses your fingers to wipe the tears off his face.

you hadn’t really registered the fact that you’d even started doing that until you see dean’s glassy and red-rimmed eyes meet yours in his barley-lit room. all you’d been thinking was that you wanted to see him. and when you saw all the wetness on his face, how ashamed he looked, you didn’t think.

case in point: you never did.

not when it came to dean.

and dean just melts all over again. you could’ve teased him, poked fun, even just got up and left— but instead, your arms are still halfway around him. you’re leaning over by his nightstand, grabbing a tissue for the snot and larger tear tracks.

he should feel embarrassed. at least a little gross.

but he didn’t.

he just felt you.

dean let his eyes flutter shut, because this had to be a dream now. he wasn’t expecting this from you, but damn if he didn’t need it. every gentle brush of your fingers on his face felt like pure gold. like you were putting him back together.

dean’s still trembling under your gaze, under your touch. but seeing him react the way he did stirs at that feeling inside your tummy that always seemed to spike when dean was around. you toss that urge away, along with the tissue you’d used on his face.

but you don’t take your hand away.

your hand was so warm, so soft was all dean could think, feel. you weren’t taking your hand away, so dean just melted like a pad of butter in a pan into your fingers that were cupping the side of his face, his eyes still shut. he could feel the slight burn of them from crying, along with the pressure in his face so high— but your thumb absentmindedly brushing on his cheek was starting to make him feel like he was floating instead.

and because he’s greedy, because he’s weak, dean’s own hand releases its hold from your shirt and finds your wrist, keeping your hand on his face. the one that used to be under his jaw had dropped when you knew that he wasn’t going to look down again.

no one’s shown dean care like this. your presence was like a blanket, like the warm, soft light of a candle. he couldn’t get enough. he never wanted it to end.

dean doesn’t know how long he stays like that— could’ve been seconds or hours. but he finally breaks the silence with a quiet, raspy “thank you”. he doesn’t open his eyes yet.

because he’s afraid that you’ll be gone when he opens them.

but you weren’t.

no, in fact? you did something much stupider.

you leaned forward and kissed dean on the cheek that your hand wasn’t currently holding.

dean’s eyes snap open in surprise at the contact if your soft lips on his skin, his trembling breaths getting stuck in his throat again— because holy hell. whatever he’d been guessing you’d do, it wasn’t even close to that.

like everyone knows now: you weren’t thinking.you just wanted him to feel better. you just didn’t know how to do that for him.

dean’s red-rimmed eyes were still wide as you leaned back, your hand on his face faltering when you see his expression, because that didn’t seem like he enjoyed it— but he didn’t drop his hand from your wrist. he wasn’t going to let you let go. you’d only kissed him on the cheek one other time, and that was when he was dying for the third, maybe fourth time? it was too long ago for him to remember, but honestly, he had been happy just dying like that, too. you’d kissed him, and that was what he needed. he didn’t want anything else from this world.

and you just did it again.

the only thing he said?

“do that again.”

now it was your turn for your breathing to stop working.

but you didn’t hesitate.

you leaned forwards once more and pressed your lips on dean’s cheek again, lingering for a second too long before you reluctantly pulled away. because you wanted more. you wanted everything, honestly. but you’d never ask that of him.

you don’t know how you’ve lasted this long, pretending not to want one of your closest friends for as long as you can remember. you can recall a time when you didn’t feel like this— back when dean winchester was just some hunter with his brother. you helped them out once in a while, since they were your age and seemed nice enough, but somewhere along the way, after an apocalypse or two, sam and dean were always kind of just… there. it was like you were on parallel paths, going in the same direction— and both had intersected at some point.

now here you were.

it was times like these you wished that dean would just pick a side. he never truly hit on you, only for a case once in a while— and he couldn’t even look at you after he did that. he never made a move, and honestly, you were fine with that, for a really long time. you’d deemed dean much too out of your league anyway, since he didn’t really flirt with you like he did every other woman that came across his path— and that was odd to you, because dean flirted with everyone.

just not… you.

and while it stung, you just pushed through it. i mean, it’s not like you haven’t been let down before— but you couldn’t place why your heart felt like it was being shredded up in your chest when you’d met lisa for the first time.

but you knew.

deep down, you knew exactly why.

you knew why your gut twisted whenever he chatted up a waitress, or a witness. you knew why your friends gave up on talking to you about him, because you were a lost cause.

because you were so stupidly in love with dean, it was almost humiliating.

every single person, even some monsters you were literally hunting had called you out on it.

and you didn’t know what the hell to do.

there were too many variables, too many outliers, and certainly not enough confidence to even consider the fact of telling him. of manning up and just taking what you wanted. because what would you even say? do? what happens after he rejects you? and what if—

your thoughts are interrupted by a warm hand on your face.

dean’s hand.

your hand was still on his cheek, one of his own still holding your wrist— but the other was now brushing a strand of hair out of your face.

and then it just… stayed there. on the side of your face.

just like you were doing to him.

you’re gonna die, you think.

once again, you found yourself wanting dean to just do something. he’d been blurring the invisible line you’d drawn for yourself, the one you swore to never cross—

unless dean wanted you to.

it was getting much harder to tell if he wanted you to or not, especially in the most recent months.

and it was killing you. slowly but surely.

“what’re you thinkin’ about?”

the words leave your mouth before you even have time to think, because dean’s hand is so warm, so big against your face and it’s really hard to focus when his own thumb is brushing on your cheek—

“you.”

the answer leaves dean’s mouth without hesitation, without another thought. it wasn’t a lie— because you were all he thought about.

dean didn’t deserve this. you. any of this. and yet, he couldn’t refuse it right now. not when you were so close to him, and your skin was so soft—

“are you—” the words get caught in dean’s throat. “are y’thinkin’ about me?”

oh, why did dean just say that. why on chuck’s green earth did he ever say that. how did he even sound more pathetic than he’d just been when he was crying in your arms? and his voice was so small, so unlike him— plus it was still raspy from his stunt he’d pulled earlier. he was an idiot. a fool. he sounded like an insecure freakin’ teenager. it was pathetic. he was pathetic—

“yeah.”

dean’s eyes flicked back up to yours— and that was a mistake, because your hand was still mirroring his own on his face, and you were looking at him like you meant what you’d just said. like he meant something.

“yeah?” the breath left dean’s mouth before he could stop it, and he hated how hopeful he sounded. he’d moved a fraction closer to you, but it felt like he just traveled a mile.

“yeah,” you nodded, a little dazed, voice barely above a whisper. because dean was so close to you now, you could feel his breath on your face. you could barely think straight, because all you wanted to do was just lean in a little further— “i don’t really, uh… stop. thinkin’ about you.”

and dean’s gonna die.

he is going to die, because you said that and you were looking down at his lips and you smelled so good and your hand was still on his face—

dean was a simple man. that’s all he’ll ever be. he’d never ask you to do something you didn’t want.

but god, he wanted you.

so the words fell out of his mouth in another exhale—

“me, either.”

oh.

the way you were looking at him right now? after he said that in response?

you wanted him, too.

you’re both not sure who moved first, but your lips were on dean’s after you leaned in and he used his hand on your face to tug you to him, closing the remaining space between you both on his bed.

the first thing you noticed?

dean tasted like home.

you didn’t kiss him too fast. neither he with you. because you wanted to map out every inch you could, and because you were half-sure that this was some fantasy your mind had cooked up out of a state of delusion. your hand on dean’s face snaked deeper back, burying into his hair, and he groaned into your mouth at the action.

that did something to you. the same thing happened when dean’s hand went into your hair, too— you made this little noise on his lips.

that did something to him.

kissing dean was actually gentle at first. not hesitant, but like you already knew how. but then after you’d both made those noises, it’s like a switch flipped. suddenly, there was way too much space in between you both— and you gripped onto the front of his shirt, tugging him towards you as you let your back hit his sheets, taking him down with you.

this wasn’t like anything you’d ever felt. no, this was going on a decade of wishing, wanting, hoping for something, anything to come of you and dean besides friendship.

and dean? dean pressed right into you, one of his hands and barely bothered to keep himself upright. he needed to touch you, feel you. another groan escapes you and him involuntarily at the friction between you both— because you’d spread your thighs, his torso fitting right between you.

and it felt good.

you couldn’t take a full breath anymore, but you didn’t dare take your lips off of dean’s. you just tugged him closer, hand still in his hair, the other on the back of one of his shoulders.

both your lips broke with a pop, you and dean taking in the same breath of air, his nose brushing against yours and eyes fluttering, because wow.

dean didn’t know he’d said that aloud until a smile tugged on your lips, eyes looking up at him like he still wasn’t real. like this wasn’t real.

“you know how long i’ve been waitin’ to do that?” dean breathes against your lips, eyes threatening to shut again.

your smile gets wider as your own eyelashes flutter at the closeness, relishing in the contact of feeling dean on top of you before you respond:

“you know how long i’ve been waiting for you to do that?”

──────────────────────── 𖤐

tags: @blossomingorchids @bluemerakis @ambiguous-avery @maddie0101 @titsout4jackles @deansbeer @sunsbaby @emeraldcrs @h8aaz @honeyryewhiskey @supernotnatural2005 @cowboysandcigarettes @soldiersgirl @bruisedfig @mostlymarvelgirl @amaris444 @kaz-2y5-spn @littlesoulshine @starzify @velvetparkerx @eggggggggggggggggggggsblog @fuckedupfate @liiiilsss @angelblqde @vmiina @mahi-wayy @viarasvogue @tinas111 @0ccvltism @plasticflowersinahistorycemetery @lunaleah @saintfaux @kimxwinchester @bettystonewell @honeyyxxbee @harlekin705 + if i missed anyone OR if you want to be added/taken off, please let me know! <3

#faith’s works . . . @bejeweledinterludes!#supernatural #dean winchester #spn #dean winchester headcanon #dean winchester x you #dean winchester x reader #dean winchester one shot #touch starved #part 2

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no-144444 · 3 days ago

Text

real- faking it au

꩜summary: lando comes home from Monza and something changes between you two

꩜pairing: fakeboyfriend! lando norris x fem! fakegirlfriend! actress! reader

Monza. Not exactly what he wanted. The whole weekend felt like a blip in his capabilities, in his team, in him. He was excited to get home, even if it was just for two days before he was off again.

You were the last thing he expected to see in his apartment. And you were cooking. In his kitchen.

“Hello…?” he spoke, finally catching your attention.

“Hi,” you smiled back, cautious, but kind. He took another step inside. “Your weekend seemed shitty so I thought I’d… drop by. If that’s ok.”

“That’s fine,” his mouth worked before his brain and it rushed out. Fuck, he sounded desperate. “I mean- yeah. That’s totally cool with me.”

“Cool,” you smiled. There was a lull for a moment. He went into his bedroom to empty his suitcase, you stayed cooking in the kitchen. There was something so… domestic about it all. So regular. Like this could really be your life. You pushed the thoughts away as he walked back out in a pair of shorts and a hoodie, looking over your shoulder.

“What are you making?”

“Pasta alla vodka,” you explained. “Want to help?”

He shrugged and pulled his sleeves up. “What do I do, chef?” he chuckled, and you rolled your eyes, but there was an undeniable smile on your lips.

“Just cut up the onions, if you don’t mind,” you instructed and turned your attention back to the pot in front of you. He followed your instructions, and handed them over as his eyes clouded with unshed tears. “Crying already, Norris?” you teased and he chuckled, washing his hands as the tears fell.

“Fuck off,” he shot back, but there was no venom behind it. “You gave me the hard job.”

“I’d hardly call cutting onions hard,” you scoffed.

“You’ve only been stirring the pot!” he shrieked.

“Don’t be ridiculous, that’s an important job,” you shooed him away, giggling. He stopped in his tracks. He watched you. The curve of your nose. The way you were still smiling. Your effortless beauty made his heart beat quicker. You turned your head and caught him looking. “What?” you chuckled.

He didn’t know what to say. “Why did you come here?” he asked, his mouth working quicker than his brain.

Your face changed into something unreadable and you turned your attention back to the pot. “Dunno,” you shrugged. “Just… thought it was the right thing to do.”

He nodded. “It was,” he said before stepping in close to you. You kept your eyes on the pot, he kept his eyes on you. “I’m not crazy, right?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about-” you started, but he cut you off.

“This. Us. Everything we do. A fake girlfriend doesn’t come over to make me feel better after a bad race, a real one does. A fake girlfriend doesn’t listen to my fucking hundreds of voicenotes and talks through every talking point in her own, a real one does. A fake girlfriend doesn’t travel halfway across the world to see me, a real one does,” he listed, his voice strained, trying to make you see, to make you understand.

“So you’re saying you want me to leave you alone?” your voice was small, smaller than he’d ever heard it. You still wouldn’t look at him.

“No!” he practically shouted, making you flinch beside him. He chuckled, turning your body to face his, his hands on your waist. “I want us to be real. Y/n, I’ve been in love with you since day one. Every fucking day you’re the first thing on my mind. I want you. I have since the start.”

“Lando… the contract ends in 4 months-”

“We don’t have to,” he shook his head. “We can… stay together.”

“We won’t get the full payout unless we do the public break-up-”

“I’ll pay. Whatever the rest of the film budget is, I’ll pay,” he promised. He didn’t care what it took. He didn’t care what reasons you gave him.

“I’m not going to make you pay,” you chuckled. “We can just… ‘fake break-up’,” you shrugged. His heart skipped a beat.

“So… we’re together together, for real?” he smiled like a little boy getting his favourite toy. You smirked, and wrapped your arms around his neck, your lips meeting his as it had before, only this time it was different. He was yours. You were his. You were real.

He wasn’t letting you go.

navigation for my blog :)

mclaren masterlist

faking it au masterlist

taglist: (just comment to be added!)

@n3versatisfied @quinquinquincy @paucubarsisimp @htpssgavi @sarx164 @freyathehuntress

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comicaurora · 19 hours ago

Note

Why did ignans decide to colonise the volcano in the first place, before they’d Adapted to its heat and fumes?

After the Nightless Day, the planet's seasons were notably thrown out of wack for a few years, and the island and other northern locations suffered from what they called the Long Winter where the cold lasted for multiple years and escalated to bitter, deadly temps in the heart of winter.

The people of Rakhn had once built their home around the Fireseed, relying on its influence for unseasonal warmth, but after the awakening of Fire, Rakhn in an earthshaking instant was transmuted from a simple island to a boiling caldera of fury that only sought to subsume the Fireseed into itself, and the Fireseed's firemage priestess in the same moment had become a humanoid pillar of awakened flame. She warded off Rakhn's efforts to consume the Fireseed for three days and nights of battle that tore the island apart in catastrophic eruption, driving the rest of the people to shelter in the shallow waters around the island. The priestess raised high obsidian walls in defense of the ancient shrine, drawing it away from the forming caldera that sought to consume her people's only source of warmth in the bitter winters.

Nobody knows exactly what was said or done between them, but at the end of the three days, Rakhn's eruption ceased and the priestess returned to her human form to tell her people that the Fireseed was safe, and its warmth would be theirs to shelter in. But Rakhn himself was to be left alone, as he had become something new, with dangerous whims and moods and no attachment to the shape or structure of his island, and the fireseed sheltered in the core of his caldera.

But this had all been long ago, and as the long winter deepened, the fireseed could not warm the island's soil. The freeze was tightening its grip.

To survive, the people finally worked up the nerve to petition Rakhn with a deal: he would let them shelter in his heated caverns until the Long Winter ended, and in return they would provide him with something new every day - a new song, story, physical work of art, etc. Rakhn agreed. He stilled his volatile rumblings and even paused his eternal war with Winter so that the collateral damage would not destroy the fragile beings that now called him home. In exchange, they broadened his horizons.

The people quickly learned that ephemeral creations like songs and stories were the way to go, because Rakhn admired physical works of art, but after the first blush he would immediately burn them for the joy of seeing how they changed in the process. The children saw this as an absolute win, but the adults found it rather disheartening.

Cold years crawled on. Bundled-up hunters would venture out onto the slopes, then quickly return to the safety and warmth of the caves. They adapted to life in Rakhn's domain, basking in the Fireseed's radiance and power.

Then came the day that the snow melted, and the ground softened and sprouted again. The people were overjoyed to walk under the sun again. But compared to the radiance of the Fireseed, they found it cold and inadequate. The plants and animals thrived, but the people did not. They had become too much something of the fire down there in the dark. Now the lack of it sickened and drained them.

Their emissary returned to Rakhn with another petition. He did not ask Rakhn to return to their previous deal; he knew Rakhn's patience was pushed to the breaking point already, having to still his destructive nature to shelter them for several long years. The people did not ask for his shelter this time. They only asked for his warmth. Rakhn was a destructive force, temperamental in his moods; they could not ask him to forever become the sort of guardian force that would never harm his own. Instead, they would build structures of their own within the deep places of the island, harness the lava, build their own way to live with the skills they'd refined over the Long Winter - and if he chose to knock it down, they only asked to be able to build it back up again.

Rakhn considered how much more boring his life would be without these little mortals, and set his price. Once a year, every year at the onset of winter, the people would honor their first deal. They would shelter in his halls and regale him with stories, so they never forgot the deal they had made that joined their fates so inextricably. It was a small price to pay for the hearth.

#asks #aurora

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visionsofyouandme · 3 days ago

Text

The Buyer

𝚜𝚢𝚗𝚘𝚙𝚜𝚒𝚜: Joel sells an item on Facebook Marketplace, and meets you in the process.

𝚠𝚘𝚛𝚍 𝚌𝚘𝚞𝚗𝚝: 2.6k

𝚠𝚊𝚛𝚗𝚒𝚗𝚐𝚜/𝚝𝚊𝚐𝚜: No Outbreak!Joel Miller x F!Reader. Meet cute. Fluff. No use of y/n. Reader has no physical descriptions but is mentioned to be shorter than Joel. Age gap (I imagine reader is late 20s-early 30s, Joel is late 40s-early 50s). Sarah and Tommy mentioned/appear. Shy!Joel. Thirsty!Reader (same). Happy and hopeful ending (cause that’s what JM deserves). NOT proofread (sorry!).

𝙰/𝙽: This wouldn't have come about if a good friend hadn't recommended this lil plot to me. It's so sweet and helped mend my heart a little after episode 2. Hope you enjoy and happy reading! <3

“I got a buyer.”

Tommy looked up from his sandwich, mid-chew.

“Okay?”

“Granddad’s old clock. Somebody wants it.”

Joel said, eyebrows furrowed as he typed out a response, setting up a time for the exchange.

“You got some kind of crotchety collector coming to haggle you?” Tommy questioned.

How about tomorrow at 1 I can send you the address

Perfect! Yeah, I can do that :)

…

Do you want cashapp or venmo?

“What the hell is a venmo?” Joel questioned, his face stern and serious. Tommy chuckled, taking a sip of his soda.

“It’s like cashapp, it’s another money transfer service.”

Can we do cash? I don’t have the vemno

Sure! I’ll see you tomorrow at 1 with cash in hand. Thanks, Joel!

Joel set down his phone, and Tommy looked at Joel, then glanced at his phone, noticing his initial question going unanswered. He raised his eyebrows as Joel dug into his sandwich again.

“Is she pretty?”

“What makes you say that?” Joel questioned, mouth full of sandwich. The brothers were far beyond propriety, especially in the middle of a workday, starving to death.

“Well, it’s not an old guy if they ask for venmo. And, you have that look about you when you see someone pretty. Hard to not notice, brother.”

Joel’s eyes flickered to his phone, and Tommy knew he caught him. Joel would never admit it, of course, but Tommy knew his brother.

“Well, I hope the sale goes well.” Tommy mused, grabbing his mini bag of chips and opening them up as Joel still kept his gaze on the phone, like he was waiting for another response.

Maybe he was. He’d never admit to it, though.

You pulled up to Joel Miller’s residence, glancing at your GPS to confirm it was the right location. Sure enough, it was, and the house was nice and modest with a clean cut lawn and an old truck in the driveway.

You pulled beside the curb and got out, squinting in the sunlight despite your sunglasses. You heard a door shut, and saw a figure emerge from the open garage. You waved, and he held up a hand back in greeting.

“Afternoon, sir!” You called, walking up the driveway. “Joel, right?”

He confirmed his identity, questioning you warily and you grinned. When you came to the threshold of the garage, you took off your sunglasses and perched them on your head.

“The one and only. Good to meet you, Joel.” you said, and damn, the picture on Facebook did him no justice. Granted, it was a long shot of him and a young woman at the beach, not giving much detail. But, you found his face and body appealing.

Really, really appealing.

“Yeah, you too.” he said. You looked to the side, seeing the clock standing not too far away. Your eyes lit up, and you looked at Joel,

“May I?” you questioned. Joel nodded, and you walked further into the garage, looking over the large grandfather clock in all of it’s glory. It was beautiful- excellent craftsmanship, and everything looked somewhat intact. Just needed some fine tuning to get it working again.

“It’s beautiful. I have the money, but do you have change?” you questioned, pulling open the case’s glass door and looking inside. Truly a testament of art and science, and you wondered how old it could be. Judging by style alone, it could be anywhere from 75 to 100 years old. You’d have to take a closer look to be sure.

“Yeah, I do.” Joel said, and you looked over at him and saw him looking out of the garage.

“That your car?” he questioned, nodding to it, his arms crossed. You nodded, standing straight and carefully closing the glass door.

“Sure is.”

“You ain’t gettin’ that clock in that tiny thing.” he said, and you rolled your eyes.

“I’ll manage. It’s a smooth ride, perfect for keeping the inside intact.” You said, and he looked over at you with a firm expression, lips pursed. If you didn’t know any better, you thought he was mad at you.

“It’s too big.” he said, and you sighed exasperatingly, turning and walking to his side to look at your little sedan.

“It’s all I’ve got. I’ve got to make do, can’t pass up an oppurtunity like this.” you said, rubbing your forehead in thought. It really was a grand clock, and you weren’t exactly sure how big it was, but you were slowly realizing there was no way it was going to fit in your car.

Shit.

Joel was silent next to you, and you could pretty much hear the gears working in his head. You glanced at him, your eyes flashing down to his wrist where you saw a black watch on his wrist. It was old, and upon looking at it for a few seconds, you noticed it wasn’t ticking and had a slight crack in the glass. You looked forward, and eyed his truck in the driveway. You opened your mouth to speak, forming the proposal in your mind in a second, until he spoke,

“I can take it to your place. It’s gonna be too heavy to lift on your own, anyway.” he said evenly, and you looked up at him, raising your eyebrows.

“You sure?” you questioned, and your eyes moved down to the watch again.

“I can fix that watch for you for repayment.” You added, and he looked down at his wristwatch, then at you with guarded brown eyes.

“You fixin’ clocks or somethin’?”

“Yeah, I’m a horologist.”

Joel looked at you, a bit of surprise in his eyes, his eyebrows shooting up. You shook your head,

“You know, a clockmaker. Fixer. Whatever- Yes, I do.” you said, waving your hand. He regarded you for a moment, and then turned to you with his arms still crossed. Deinitely guarded, definitely wary of you.

“You’d do that?”

“For free, sure. If you help me get this bad boy in my apartment I’ll do it for your trouble.” You offered, and looked at him with a smile. You saw something in his eyes soften a bit, his shoulders droop a bit, his lips loosen-

Whoops. Okay, don’t linger too long on that, you thought to yourself.

“It ain’t trouble,” he said, his voice more quiet, soft, intimate. “But, it’s a deal.”

He stuck out his hand, and you took it without hesitation, giving his hand a firm shake. It was warm, calloused and rough, a working man’s hands. Strong. Capable. Attractive.

Something about an older man with strong hands and disposition just got your blood pumping.

Also, your attention to detail noticed no wedding ring.

Interesting.

Dropping his hand, you spoke, “You can come by Friday, if you want-”

“How about today? I’m already off work for the day.” he questioned, and you shrugged almost immediately.

“Sure. Don’t see why not.” You said grinning. Joel gave a nod, and then looked at the clock hesitantly. Like he was second guessing the sale.

“Hey,” you said, grabbing his attention. “It’s going to good hands. Promise.”

“It was my granddad’s. His dad’s before him.” he said, and you nodded. Most clocks like this were family heirlooms, and you were surprised at this reveal that he was selling it.

“You sure you wanna sell it?” you questioned, a bit disheartened at not being able to buy it, but if it meant more to Joel than just a clock, you’d easily give it up. Joel nodded, his eyes flickering to it once more before walking to his work desk and began pulling out ratchet straps to secure the clock in his truck.

It really was a two person job, but this was expected. Still, you and Joel got it in and secured to the truck bed, and Joel swung himself over the edge of the truck, landing on his feet.

Yeah, that was hot.

You nodded, clapping your hands together,

“I’ll send you the address, or you can follow me.”

“I’ll follow you.”

You nodded, bidding him a short goodbye before walking to your car, no longer hiding your grin as you turned on the ignition.

Joel pulled up to the house, relieved it was only in the next neighborhood from his, about 10 minutes away. He pulled in backwards into your driveway, facing the garage. He climbed out just as the garage door opened, and he saw quite a scene before him. It looked similiar to his own garage and workshop- and he knew what you would say if he questioned it’s organization.

“There’s a method to the madness,” he would tell people. He was sure you’d say the same.

You walked over and took off your sunglasses, Joel watching you as you walked over to your main workbench and set them down. He noticed coffee mugs, plenty of tools and small pieces of metal of various shapes and sized. There was a space in the middle of the garage where he assumed the clock would go. Turning to him and smiling brightly, he looked down and then climbed onto the bed of the truck, undoing the straps. He could feel your gaze on him, and he was thankful the Austin heat already had him flushed.

He wasn’t used to the attention of a woman, much less someone as pretty and personable as you. He knew he must be delusional, thinking he noticed your lingering looks around and at him. But, he noticed you look back in your rearview mirror several times on the way over, making sure he was right behind you.

Since you both experienced it together, getting it off was easier than putting it on. You slowly set it upright, and Joel took off the blanket surrounding it to keep the glass from breaking. You took a step back, and grinned.

“It’s perfect.”

“What are you gonna do with it?” he questioned, hoping you weren’t going to repaint it into a beige or white mess, stripping it of it’s uniqueness. He was unsure, even still, of if he wanted to do this or not. But, he looked at your face and saw a softness to it, admiring like it was something precious, which it was. To Joel, anyway.

“Fix it up, get it ticking again. Shine up the wood, get rid of the dust, maybe replaced the glass with something like stained glass.” you mused, your hands on your hips that he realized you were mirroring from him. He cleared his throat, nodding and stood straight. He looked down at his own watch, the one Sarah got for him when he turned 36. It had seen so much love and attention, and he still wore it despite the crack from wear and the absence of the ticking.

Another sentimental piece. But, Joel would never, ever part with this one.

You finally broke from your stare at the clock and walked to your car, retrieving your bag and walked back to Joel’s side, handing the wad of cash over. He looked down at it, and hesitated, then shook his head.

“Keep it. Fixing this will be more than enough payment.” he said, looking down at the watch on his wrist. He looked at you, surprised to find you so close. He could see the rise and fall of your chest, the sunlight reflecting in your eyes, the slight persperation on your temples. All of it just echoing how much of a beautiful young woman you were.

Sarah would tease him about staring, and wiggle her eyebrows at him. He could hear her encouraging words in his ear, “Don’t just stand there, say something!”

“Of course. I can have it done by next week. Gotta measure the glass out, get it ordered, find a battery that I’m sure I have, do some other lowkey maintenance…” you said, rambling on and Joel just watched, a small smile forming on his face.

It had been a minute since he’s been in the presence of someone like you. Someone kind, open, giving. Pretty. Effortless. Helpful.

He’d only known you for an hour and he could go on.

Maybe he should just take the jump. Worst you could say is no.

“I’ll take you out to dinner as a “thank you,”” he said, and he could see the surprise bloom on your face, eyebrows raising and lips parted.

“I… Joel, I’m fixing it as a payment for you-”

“And I’ll say thank you. Over dinner.” he said, and he suddenly felt his stomach drop at your lack of response. It was like you were a deer in the headlights, taken completely by surprise.

Maybe this was a mistake. He should have just taken the money, forget about the watch-

“Okay.” you said, and he was ripped from his thoughts like a bandaid. All in one swift motion, relief following.

“I’ll, uh, pick you up. There’s a good Mexican place in town. Great taquitos.” he said, and you nodded, glancing around as if considering the offer.

“Sure. But I don’t think I wanna wait until next week. How about Saturday?”

“Deal.” Joel said, and you looked at him with an amused expression.

“Wanna shake on it?” you teased, and Joel rolled his eyes.

“Ha, ha. Saturday, at 6.” he said, and you nodded. He began to walk away, and you called out to him.

“The watch.” you said, and he paused, looking down and then walked back to you. He slowly undid the leather strap, and waited a moment before handing it to you. Your fingers brushed, and you held it with such care with both hands. His hand lingered over yours, then let it drop.

“I’ll take good care of it, Joel. Promise.” you said, smiling lightly. He nodded, lifting his eyes to meet yours. He felt something within himself relax, come together to release some tension, like a rubberband that had been released from it’s stretch.

“Thank you.” he said quietly. You nodded, and you both stood in your garage, holding each other’s gaze until Joel looked away, smiling sheepishly.

“Saturday. 6.”

“You’re picking me up.” you stated. He nodded, rubbing the back of his neck.

“I’ll see you then.” he said, beginning to back up. You were about to say somethign when his back hit his truck, and he winced. You stifled a giggle, and bit your lower lip.

“I’ll see you then, Joel.” you replied, and turned, walking to your workbench and sat down, laying out Joel’s watch tenderly, turning on the lamp next to you.

He felt giddy, and quickly climbed into his truck and put a hand on the steering wheel, exhaling sharply through his nose.

That ghost of a smile lingered on his face, the hope of Saturday carrying him all the way home.

Thank you for reading! Drop a like, comment, or reblog. Love hearing from you guys <33 Divider by @/saradika-graphics !

#joel miller #joel tlou #joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller x ofc #tlou hbo #joel miller fanfiction #pedro pascal #visionsfics #no outbreak!joel miller #joel miller fluff #hbo joel miller

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moonlitsmile · 2 days ago

Text

What he left behind

(happy ending ♡︎) original here

summary | Joel watching you get tortured by Abby, after letting him go and they leave, he goes to check on you. Only to find you still alive and breathing

a/n - here’s the alternate happy ending where you live guys (buts it still sad I’m SORRYYY) (also Tommy was unaware of abby and what happen just stay with me 💔)

They let him go like it means nothing now.

Joel drops to the wood floor the second their hands release him, his knees slamming into the ground. He barely feels it. Doesn’t move. Doesn’t speak.

Abby tosses the blood-slick golf club aside. It lands beside your body with a sickening, hollow clunk.

Then she walks away. No more words. No triumph. Just silence.

The others follow her out the door, boots thudding over the dark wood floor of the lodge, fading like a bad dream.

And Joel is alone.

He stares at you, frozen.

You haven’t moved in minutes. You’d gone quiet after the last blow. Too quiet.

For a while, he doesn’t breathe.

Then, slowly, like it takes everything he has, he crawls toward you.

“Baby…” His voice is raw, almost unrecognizable.

His hands hover over your body, too scared to touch, afraid that if he does, you’ll shatter for good.

But then—

You twitch.

Barely. A shallow, choked breath escapes your lips. Blood clings to your teeth.

Joel freezes. “Oh my god—oh, god—you’re breathin’. You’re breathin’, baby—shit, stay with me, please—”

Suddenly he’s moving, hands pressing down to slow the bleeding where he can, brushing blood from your face with shaking fingers. “I got you. I got you, alright? Just keep your eyes on me.”

Your lashes flutter weakly. You’re there. Fading in and out, but alive.

“Don’t try to talk, just—just stay still.” He shrugs off his coat in seconds, bunching it under your head, tearing pieces of his shirt to stop the worst of the bleeding. His hands are slick with your blood, but he keeps going, muttering broken reassurances.

“I’m gonna get you outta here. You’re not gonna die on me, you hear? Not like this.”

His voice cracks again.

Tears streak down his face, hot against the cold air of the door open and cold breeze coming in. but he doesn’t notice. He’s completely focused on you.

You try to speak. Just a whisper. “Joel…”

“No, no—don’t talk. Save your strength.” His forehead presses against yours, breath shaking. “I’m gonna fix this. I swear, I’m gonna fix this.”

His hand finds yours, gripping tight.

And for the first time since they dragged you out into the snow… hope flickers in Joel’s chest.

Because you’re still here.

And he’ll do whatever it takes to keep you that way.

Your breathing is shallow, every breath a struggle, rattling in your chest like it might give out at any second.

Joel’s hands won’t stop shaking.

He presses down on a gash along your ribs, trying to stem the bleeding with what’s left of his flannel. Blood soaks through in seconds. You let out a soft, broken cry, and his whole body flinches.

“I know baby, I know—I’m sorry—just hold on,” he whispers, over and over like a prayer, like if he says it enough, it’ll keep you here.

Tears mixed with blood dripping from your head clings to your lashes. Your lips are cracked and red. But you’re still breathing.

You’re still here.

And he can’t lose you too.

Not again.

His vision blurs, just for a second, and suddenly it’s not you beneath him anymore.

It’s Sarah.

Fourteen years old. Dying in his arms.

Her blood on his hands, just like now.

Her voice, her whimper:

Joel blinks hard. “No. No—no.”

This is not the same.

But it’s all he can think about, how you might die in his arms, someone he loves. Just like before.

But he won’t have that

He rips off what’s left of his shirt sleeve, tying it tightly around your thigh where another cut seeps red into the wood. His movements are frantic, uneven, but his mind is locked on one thing:

You are not dying here.

“I didn’t get to save her,” he murmurs under his breath, jaw clenched so tight it aches. “I held her… and she died anyway.”

He holds your face gently, his hands seeping with your blood now, turning your head to make you look at him.

“But you—I can still save you. I will. You hear me?”

You blink slowly. Barely there. But it’s enough. Enough to tear Joel in half and put him back together all at once.

He scans the treeline. He knows Jackson’s not far. If he can just get you back, just get someone, anyone, to help—

He slides his arms beneath you, carefully but quickly. You cry out again, weak and choked, but you don’t stop breathing.

“Shhh… I know, sweetheart, I know,” he whispers, holding you to his chest as he stands. His knees almost buckle, but he tightens his grip and locks his jaw.

“Just a little longer. We’re gettin’ outta here.”

Each step is agony, not for him, but for what he sees.

Blood trailing behind.

Your limp form cradled in his arms.

The memory of his daughter dying in his arms haunting every second.

But he keeps going.

Because this time, he’s not too late.

Not for you.

The snow comes down harder now.

The cold cuts straight through Joel’s skin, soaking him to the bone, but he doesn’t stop.

Your weight is heavy in his arms, not because he can’t carry you, but because every step feels like a second stolen from death. Your head rests against his chest, and he keeps checking, over and over, just to feel your breath against his neck.

“Almost there,” he mumbles. “Almost there, baby. Stay with me.”

His legs ache. His fingers are numb. His flannel is torn and soaked through, but you’re wrapped tight in his jacket, held close to his body, protected as best he can.

The gates of Jackson come into view like a miracle through the white blur.

Joel stumbles forward, lips cracked and blue. “Help!” he tries to shout, but it comes out hoarse. “Someone—please”

The guards on watchtower duty shout something down, voices muffled by the wind. He can’t hear them. Doesn’t care. He’s through the outer fence before they can open the gate, banging a fist on it with one hand while holding you tighter with the other.

The metal creaks open and he’s through, barely holding it together, falling to his knees just past the threshold.

People run toward him, Tommy’s among them, wide-eyed, shouting his name.

“Joel?! What the hell happened—what—what the fuck happened to her?”

“She’s hurt,” Joel cuts him off, eyes wild, voice cracking. “She’s hurt bad—I need a doctor, now.”

Tommy kneels beside him, trying to help lift you. Joel snaps, pulling you closer. “Don’t touch her—”

“She’s gonna be okay,” Tommy says quickly, hands raised. “We’ll get her help. I promise.”

Joel finally lets go, just enough for two others to take you gently from his arms and rush toward the clinic.

He staggers to his feet, about to follow, but the cold and exhaustion catch up with him all at once. His knees buckle, and he falls hard into the snow.

“Joel!” Tommy grabs him, pulling his arm around his shoulders. “Come on—we’re goin’ with her.”

“Don’t leave her alone,” Joel rasps. “Don’t let her be alone.”

“You’re comin’ too.”

They get him back on his feet, half-dragging, half-guiding him toward the clinic. Joel’s lips are still moving as they go, quietly, breathlessly, the same words over and over:

She’s gonna be okay. She’s gonna be okay. She’s gonna be okay…

The clinic doors burst open as they rush you inside.

Joel tries to follow, but someone, he doesn’t even know who, presses a hand to his chest. “You can’t come in. We need space to work.”

“She needs me—she needs me,” he snaps, trying to push past, but Tommy’s there, grabbing his arm.

“They’re gonna help her, Joel. That’s the best thing we can do right now.”

Joel watches as your limp form disappears down the hallway, swallowed by voices and the harsh fluorescent light. The doors swing shut behind you.

He stands there in the cold.

Staring.

Listening.

Every sound, every shout from the nurses, every beep from machines, every second of silence, drives another crack through his chest.

“C’mon,” Tommy says gently, voice quiet. “Let’s get you home. You’re freezing. You can come back after you clean up, get a little rest.”

Joel shakes his head. “No.”

“Just for a bit. She’s in good hands now.”

“No.” His voice is sharp, final. “I ain’t leavin’.”

Tommy’s silent for a second. “Alright,” he says eventually, softer. “But at least come sit inside. Get warm. You look like hell.”

Joel doesn’t move. He stares at the clinic doors, jaw tight.

“If I leave,” he says quietly, “and she dies while I’m gone…”

Tommy exhales, nodding. “Alright. I get it.”

But Joel’s eyes don’t leave the hallway. “And if she wakes up and I’m not there—she’s gonna think I left her. Like I gave up.”

He lowers himself slowly onto the bench outside the exam room, back stiff, blood dried on his hands and arms. His whole body trembles, but not from the cold anymore.

Tommy stands nearby, watching him with a worried look. “What if she doesn’t wake up, Joel?”

Joel swallows hard. “Then I make sure I’m the one she sees last.”

There’s silence between them. Only the wind outside and the muffled sounds from the medical room.

Then Joel speaks again, quieter.

“She ain’t safe. Not really. Not until that girl’s gone. If I go back to the house, and she follows me—she finishes what she started. She kills her.”

Tommy sits next to him. “We’ll post people outside. We’ll keep an eye on you both.”

Joel shakes his head. “I ain’t takin’ chances. Not again.”

He leans forward, hands clasped between his knees, knuckles stained red.

And he waits.

Even as the hours pass. Even as his bones ache and the blood on his skin dries and flakes away.

He waits.

Because he has to be there when you open your eyes.

Because this time… he still has the chance to keep someone alive.

It’s dark behind your eyes.

Heavy.

Pain pulses through your body in slow, echoing waves, not sharp anymore, but dull and deep, like your bones remember what was done.

You try to move.

Can’t.

There’s a weight in your chest. Your limbs feel like lead. Your throat is dry, lips cracked, every breath rasping against your ribs.

But then—

A voice. Low, familiar. Breaking.

“Hey…”

You fight through the fog. Your eyelids twitch. Open just a little.

Light.

And Joel.

He’s sitting beside you chair that was in the small room, hunched forward with his elbows on his knees, eyes fixed on your face like he hasn’t looked away in hours

You blink again, barely able to focus, but he’s already reaching for you.

“Hey, hey—there you are,” he breathes out, his voice rough and low. His hand trembles as it brushes your cheek, thumb sweeping gently over your skin. “You’re alright. You’re safe now.”

You want to speak, but nothing comes out. Not yet. Just a soft sound, barely a breath.

Joel leans in closer. His eyes are red-rimmed, haunted, but filled with something deeper, something desperate and fierce.

“You scared the hell outta me,” he murmurs. “I thought—” He cuts himself off, blinking hard. “But you didn’t. You fought. You held on.”

He swallows hard, looking down at your hand. He picks it up carefully, holding it in both of his like it’s the most fragile thing in the world.

“I couldn’t do nothin’,” he says, almost a whisper. “I had to watch them do that to you. I just… stood there.”

You try to squeeze his hand. Your fingers barely twitch, but it’s enough.

He notices.

And something cracks in him.

“I ain’t never felt that kind of fear in a while.”

His voice shakes now. “You’re all I got..”

He brings your hand to his lips, pressing it there, holding it like a lifeline.

“I’m gonna keep you safe now. I swear to you,” he says. “Ain’t nobody touchin’ you again. Not her. Not anyone. I’ll burn the whole goddamn world down before I let it happen.”

You shift slightly, wincing. Joel’s hand instantly comes to steady you.

“Shh—don’t push it. Just rest. I ain’t goin’ anywhere.”

You meet his eyes, tired, broken, but burning with love.

And even through the pain, even through everything… you feel safe.

Because Joel is still here.

And he’s not letting go.

#the last of us part 2 #the last of us #tlou fanfiction #tlou hbo #joel tlou #joel miller #joel miller angst #pedro pascal joel miller #pedro pascal #moonlitsmile

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inthehouseoffinwe · 1 day ago

Text

I think of all the elves, of all his family, Maglor best understands what it is to be world weary. To want to leave. I feel like there’s this connection which forms between his and his grandmother’s fëa, and over time, she’s even able to reach out. To give him a little comfort. To give him just enough will to keep going, because Maglor would never forgive himself if he didn’t:

Miriel on the ocean’s waves, adding a little tune of her own to Maglor’s lament

Maglor not even fully away of what he’s singing, what part of the Noldolantë is being composed but still picking up the quicksilver thread and turning it into its own tapestry

Miriel’s strangely proud of her singer

Maglor alone and cold and lost in hallucinations and dreams. Miriel reaches out and is able to twist them into good ones. Into memories of Aman, memories with his brothers and cousins from a time less marred

Miriel sees her son in the halls and watches him determinedly walk through each section depicting his sons’ fates, make himself see what he did to his family.

And he manages to make it to the end, soaking each one with his tears

But then he sees his second son alone, screaming his grief to the ocean, he collapses

His other sons he has comforted, he’s held snd assured them of his love. He’s sent them on their way to be healed and released.

But this one… this one he cannot reach

And it breaks her heart. She knows too well what it is to see your son in agony and have no way of comforting him. Of assuring him you don’t hate him, that you want him to move on and live a full life again.

She sings her own grief into the next tapestry of Maglor’s she weaves, and is stunned to hear a song reaching right back

Vairë and Námo tell her Kanafinwë’s power reaches to her threads. She weaves their history and he sings it.

Their fëa which should have connected in life, now connect in each of their deaths.

Námo seems to smile at this development and gently wiping away her tears gestures to the newest tapestry of Maglor clenching his burnt, blood soaked hand. More spirit than elf.

“Call to him.”

She does.

And she finds him responding in his semi awareness.

Maglor is his music. Maglor is his song. What remained of anything else is swept away in the endless tides of his grief and lamentation

He’s fading. Becoming a spectre of the shore because he will not die. Refuses to die.

But this little spark of home, the fire so similar to his father’s but older, more steady and persisting, breaks him from his fading.

And when Fëanor beholds the newest tapestry, his remaining son has more colour to him, tattered robes standing out against the grey backdrop, and his head is tilted as if listening intently to something.

He looks *alive*

The next tapestries solidify Maglor even more. Where he was blue and grey, faded red comes back, his loose hair falls in his favoured braids, eyes clear grey shining tree light rather than milky white.

Maedhros, so like his father, determined to see his little brother fade in a final attempt to atone and keep him company as he’d failed to before, is stunned

And when his grandmother sings his brother’s song, he understands.

Miriel holds his hands warmly.

“I’ll take care of him until he comes home. Go, Maitimo. Heal. Be there when he returns.”

Fëanor sits for years, in front of the weaving of Maglor’s small smile as he beholds a crab crawling along his robe. The first smile since he let go of his twin stars.

Eyes wide. Unblinking. As if turning away would bring everything crashing down and Maglor will be a wraith again

Miriel continues to call out to her grandson, and the spirit that brought Fëanor’s fire to the world slowly revives his son.

She breaks her son from his frozen state and takes him to her weaving room.

“Ammë?” He sounds lost.

She smiles and in a familiar sing song gestures to the loom.

“Look, Fëanaro.”

Because there sits Maglor, singing still but with new robes, a smile creasing his eyes and his foster son leaning into his side.

And behind, a familiar silver haired figure in the ocean mist singing right alongside him

“Ammë… you?” Fëanor’s jaw falls. “How? Why?”

“He is my grandson, yonya,” she says firmly. “As for how…”

She explains the connection, and the song.

Somehow in speaking the Doom, Maglor reached through Mandos’ halls to the one member of his family whose skill lay in the same craft.

“Does he know?” Fëanor finally asks, tears streaming down his cheeks.

Does he know his family love him. They protect him. They long to see him again. That he can come *home*-

To this, Miriel sighs.

“I do not know. But he knows he is not alone.”

Maglor returns with Elrond to Imladris where he meets a little boy called Hope who speaks of ancestors reaching out to him and innocently asks the old elf if his family do the same.

She’s glad to be the one recording Maglor’s stunned face, and for the first time, laughs while weaving. It’s enough to bring Fëanor desperately knocking and Vairë shaking her head.

Some days pass and for the first time, she hears a song reaching out with intent. A hesitant question.

“Atya?” It calls.

She sings back.

“Not quite, my Songbird, though he sends you his love.”

Quicksilver hands and restless humming.

“It cannot be…”

“Hello, grandson of mine.”

Her influence is no longer needed, for Maglor is alive and healthy and keeping the heir of Isildur safe. Teaching him all he knows.

But she sings alongside him as he fights in the final battle by the Black Gate. Song and sword flashing as they haven’t in two ages.

She grabs Fëanor by the hand to show him Maglor singing and laughing at little Estel and Arwen’s wedding. And for the first time, Fëanor’s weeping is for joy.

Then the Doom is officially lifted read: please come back, everyone misses you and Galadriel is to sail.

And Miriel reaches out one last time.

“The Doom is long lifted. It’s time to come home, Makalaurë.”

And when Maglor comes home, he sees a silver haired elf in his periphery, grin flashing white in the afternoon sun before she disappears again

Miriel will never leave the halls.

She doesn’t need to.

Because she’s firmly entrenched in their family now, and Maglor sings to her everyday.

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caoimhewrites · 2 days ago

Text

Take It or Leave It

Undying Ground (Pt 3)

Ghosts decides... do you accept?

Tags/CW: brief mentions of grief/loss, non-graphic mentions of injury, post apocalyptic world, zombie mentions WC: 2k

Pairing: Simon Riley x Reader. Reluctant allies to lovers

Series Masterlist → here

A/N- Dabbling in a little Ghost pov. Don't know if I'll keep up with it

The cans were a clever move. They almost gave him away when he had snuck up on you days ago. He almost felt angry with himself for not thinking of it. Relying on the sounds of growls outside the fence he built around the cabin wasn't the most foolproof solution when it came to alerting him to get rid of any infected that wandered too close.

He's spent days watching you sleep, eat and struggle with your bandages. There's something about you, something interesting, but he can't put his finger on it. Maybe it's the way you watch him back or the few words you speak in your conscious moments that have him biting back a small chuckle.

No.

Not that. Definitely not that.

You're up now, walking around with much more ease and no more limp. He doesn't speak when he sees you moving around. You've made yourself useful by packing up your things and Ghost would be lying if he said he wasn't a little... disappointed? He may have gotten the better of you a few days ago but still... you had skills to have made it this far. Five years, alone or not, was an achievement in this world. Ghost didn't consider himself to be a curious man. Didn't bother himself with the goings on of other people, not even before the sickness spread but the intrigue of you won't fade.

He's being practical, he tells himself. A decision like this… it makes sense, it's realistic. He's not getting any younger and the infected only find his cabin more frequently, their numbers only seeming to grow. Maybe a little help wouldn't be so bad?

No. Not help.

Ghost doesn't need help. He's never needed help a day in his life but maybe... an extra set of hands wouldn't hurt. If you stay as quiet as you usually are, fend for yourself, scavenge your own meds... it could work. He could find a way to tolerate it.

He's talked himself out of it a million times. He doesn't know you. His initial suspicions could be right. You might slink off in the middle of the night with all his things, leaving him practically defenseless. Or you could just end him. He's mulled that possibility over more times than he can count. He's been betrayed before. Before and after the world fell apart and as far as he's concerned he's in no rush to repeat history.

But he had to choose. Risk you betraying him, or possibly get swarmed by so many infected that even a man like him couldn't fight them. Or worse, some other lunatic who won't sit quietly like you do, keep to themselves and get out of his space whenever he asks. Someone who wouldn't hesitate to take everything he owned and toss him out as food for the infected.

So that's exactly what Ghost does. He chooses. Against every single instinct, every life lesson, every rational thought.

He chooses.

You can stay... For now.

You hear him before you see him. It feels strange. He’s always appearing out of nowhere, leaving a delirious you confused and scared shitless before the details of his frame clear. But, today it’s like he wants his presence to be known.

“Yeah, yeah I’m going,” you murmur as you shove your old tattered coat into your bag. The summer still rages outside, leaving you far too sweaty even in the relatively cool damp of Ghost’s cabin. You had used it as a blanket when the shivers set in, side aching. Now it really serves no purpose, just weighing you down until the winter comes again.

“Stop.” His voice is demanding, slightly cold.

“What? Why?” You freeze your movements, looking up at his towering frame. It casts a long shadow across the room, blocking out the light from the oil lamp.

“You can stay.” His words come out flat, emotionless.

“Stay?” You can’t be sure you heard him right. Stay? Why on earth would this man let you stay? You still haven’t figured out why he would take you here in the first place.

“Under some conditions.” He adds, words keeping their flatness.

“Conditions?”

He rubs a frustrated hand over his face, venom lacing his voice. “Will you just- stop repeating everything I’m saying and listen.”

“Sorry,” you mutter quietly.

“You can stay… under some conditions. You get your own food, your own medication and first aid. I will not help you. If you get stuck out there, people or infected. I will not help you. If you get injured. I will not help you. You will sleep in the corner. If you want a mattress, find one. And…” He pauses, his brown eyes boring into yours, “stay the hell away from my room.”

The question slips out before you can stop yourself, “why are you letting me stay? We don’t know each other. I mean… you let me heal here but, why?”

He hesitates, jaw clenched as he chooses his words wisely. “We… could be allies.” He says it like it physically pains him, like any suggestion of having someone else around goes against every instinct and desire.

"Why should I trust you?" Your tone is accusatory, sharp like a knife.

"Why should I trust you?" He echoes, eyes narrowing dangerously.

"You're the one who asked me to stay." You tilt your head, throwing in as much sass as you possibly can.

He lets out a huff at your words. You're right, but he's not going to admit that. He isn't the type of man to be wrong and certainly not the type of man to admit when he is. "Doesn't mean I trust you."

"Well I don't trust you either," you retort in a snarky tone, face scrunching in annoyance.

"Good."

What does that mean? Good? Good? Your stomach churns in annoyance. He's the one who brought you here. He's the one who asked you to stay.

"Well? You staying or what?" His tone is sharp, impatient.

You didn't realize how long you had been silent, neglecting to answer his question, head spinning. What options do you have? Stay with this guy who's mildly annoying and definitely a bit out of his mind but at least have a roof over your head or go back out on your own with hardly any remaining supplies and legions of infected wandering the earth who wouldn't hesitate to make you their next lunch?

"Take it or leave it," he adds with an annoyed sigh.

"Fine. I'll stay... I guess."

---

Ghost wasn't kidding when he said he wouldn't help you. He hasn't lifted a single finger in the second week that you've been occupying his floor. You haven't bothered to do much more for him. It's tense and awkward, the atmosphere thick enough to slice with even the dullest knife. Your conversations are short and stilted, exchanging nothing more than a few words each day.

But, you keep up your end of the deal. Stay quiet and out of his space. It's not too bad, you've had roommates far worse.

Yet, he still watches you. Quite frequently in fact, his distrust obvious. In all fairness, you don't trust him either. Sure, he lets you stay and keeps to himself, not even bothering to pretend to be your friend, but even still, he could always betray you. It's the risk you run in this world.

"So... Where did you learn the trick with the cans?" he asks, eyes studying you suspiciously as he sits across the small table from you.

"A friend." You reply, voice clipped.

"Infected?"

"Yeah... Infected," you murmur quietly, the word feeling heavy on your tongue like you almost can't speak it. Your mind swirls with memories of Vivienne. You can't be sure of exactly how long it's been, the days you spent half conscious on Ghost's floor were hard to keep track of. You think it's been three weeks since the infected found your camp. Three weeks without the one person who had been with you through everything. Thinking about her always seemed to make you feel worse. Knowing that after so little time, her voice had already been forgotten.

"You've been traveling?" He's pushed his food away now, focusing solely on you. His words feel more like an interrogation than an actual conversation.

"Yeah. Quite a lot since the start." You give a small nod, picking at your dinner.

"Where did you start? Virginia?"

You let out a huff and finally meet his eyes, looking up from the overcooked squirrel on the plate in front of you. "North Carolina actually."

You're tempted to ask him about himself but something in his eyes stops you. Something tired and... sad? Maybe if you could see his face you could understand it better. Trying to read him just through his eyes was proving to be quite difficult. His body language reveals even less— always statuesque.

The minutes pass in an awkward and tense silence, the only sound is the rustling of the fabric of your clothes as you eat in silence. "You... uhhh you been here since the start?" You regret it as soon as you say it, your question slipping past your lips shakily.

"Yes. Military," he says simply, offering nothing else. His shortness makes exasperation rise in your chest. Who is he to ask about your life, but give hardly anything in return? He’s the one who brought you here, who suggested you be “allies”, whatever that means to him. You shake the feeling off, you’re not going to let him get to you. It’s fine. It works. You can live with it. Dealing with Ghost’s interrogations mixed with indifference is paradise compared to the last five years.

“Right. Military,” you parrot, awkwardly tapping your wooden fork against your plate. You suspected he had made them both. They had that kind of rustic quality, much like the things your grandfather had made for your grandmother years ago. But these didn’t carry the comfort of their home or any home really. Nothing cute and sweet, just made from need and practicality.

He lifts his mask just slightly so he can take another bite of his food. You see pink lips and a strong jaw dusted with blond stubble. It’s the only clue you had to how he looked beyond his brown eyes. You tried to piece him together, playing a game in your head, creating a million different versions of the man under the mask. None seemed too convincing. There was always something off, something that didn’t fit. It bothered you day and night not to know.

“You’re low on supplies.” He spoke without looking up.

“I know.” You stare at him as you take a bite of the stale bread on your plate that Ghost had actually decided to share with you to your surprise.

“You’ll need more. There’s a town down the road, not too far. I checked it out a few weeks ago, not much has been taken.”

“Many infected?” Your voice is quiet but practical.

“Just a few.” He shrugs and glances up at you. There it is again. That look. The tiredness has seeped into him so deeply that you feel it radiating out of him. Five years alone out here will do that to you. Five years in some place that isn’t anything like home. Maybe it’s been there longer, you think. Maybe it’s something he’s been carrying on his shoulders for so long that tired is just who he’s become.

“I’ll go tomorrow then,” you say as you set the bread down. You see now why he gave it to you, it’s basically inedible. You would need several more rows of the world strongest and sharpest teeth to get through it.

He lets out a low hum and nods, “I’ll go with you. Need some things. Don’t expect me to-”

“I know, I know.” You wave your hand in dismissal, cutting him off with a small huff. “You won’t help me.”

Taglist: @little-mini-me-world @angeldemon28 @iminlovewithjasontodd @i-like-foxs @dravenskye @lilynotdilly @thatghostlykid

#fanfic #chapter fic #series fanfic #cod fanfic #call of duty fanfic #ghost cod #simon riley x reader #simon riley #simon riley cod #ghost x reader #simon ghost riley #call of duty #call of duty modern warfare #cod modern warfare #cod mw2 #cod #cod x reader #caoimhewrites

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dantes-jacket · 19 hours ago

Text

Let me make it better

Dante x fem reader

Author notes: request number two babyyy. You have a bad day and Dante makes it so much better! Hurt/comfort, pure fluff with Dante, he is so amazing I wish he was real

Today has sucked. No, suck isn’t strong enough word. It was a complete fucking dumpster fire today. It seemed like the world was against you no matter what you did.

It all started off when you woke up. You were walking downstairs to make some breakfast when you tripped on the last step. You couldn’t catch yourself so you ended up landing hardly on your knee. As soon as you got up you already felt it throbbing and a bruise forming. That should have been your sign that today was going to be awful.

You groan as you walk to the kitchen. You decide to keep breakfast simple by just having some peanut butter toast. When the toast finished popping you lather both pieces of bread in peanut butter only for them to fall on the floor when carrying the plate over to the table. Not only did they fall on the floor, they landed on the peanut butter side. Now it’s one sticky messy to clean up. That should have been your sign to go back to bed.

Trying to beat the odds of the morning you decide to go treat yourself to your favorite cafe a block away. You don’t have any trouble getting dressed but when you’re getting ready you realize that you ran out of your favorite mascara. You roll your eyes cursing this day already.

You decide to forgo makeup today since you wouldn’t be able to complete the look. You head out to the cafe, the walk is only about five minutes and it’s a nice one. The weather doesn’t match your mood because it’s all bright and sunny. It’s as if it’s taunting you.

You get to the cafe to see it empty and dark. There’s a sign on the door that says, “Closed for renovations.” What? This was opened yesterday when you walked by. Where was the notice? You’re cut out of your thoughts when your stomach growls loudly.

You decide to head to the grocery store. It’s only up the road so you can finally get some food. You can even see if they have your mascara.

Getting to the grocery store was again easy and finding some food to sit down and eat was easy too. Maybe today was turning around for you. After you ate, you go and look for your mascara. You head to the little beauty department the store has.

You look up and down the aisles until you find the one the mascara is in. You see its toward the back of the aisle. You sneak by a couple other women in the aisle and end up in front of the mascara. There’s rows of mascara so you look for the brand name then the type you had.

When you find the tag for it you see that there is an empty row. The only empty row in all of the mascara options. Because why not!? You hang your head in defeat. Your body on autopilot takes you out of the store.

You walk out from the awning the store had and then you’re suddenly wet. You finally look up to see now it is down pouring. It was just sunny without a cloud in the sky. Now you’re here without an umbrella having to walk all the way back to Devil May Cry. That thought alone makes you wanna cry. Then you’re also hit with the fact that your white haired boyfriend wouldn’t even be there because he’s out on some stupid mission fighting some stupid demon.

Now that makes you cry. You hang your head again and make the slow walk back to Devil May Cry. How could this day be so against you? You haven’t done anything bad to anyone so why all this bad karma all of a sudden?

By the time you get back you’re soaked and convinced you’re going to catch a cold now because of it. You unlock the door and head inside to be met with your boyfriend.

He’s taking off all of the weapons he carries once he hears you he turns to look at you. Dante lets out a low whistle, “Damn babe, you’ve seen better days.”

You drop your purse and kick off your shoes in silence. You finally look at him and he stops in his spot. He sees your red eyes and tears streaming down your face. He’s at a loss for words. Did his comment make you upset? He was just joking.

You then walk over to him and bury your face in his chest and sob harder. He’s quick to wrap his arms around you, not caring about getting wet. He places one hand on your head and gently rubs it up and down.

“I’m right here. Let it out.” He murmurs hoping that he’ll be able to find out what’s wrong.

You clutch the front of his shirt tightly and stumble out about how bad your day has been. You tell him about every tiny detail and question why it had to happen to you. You do end off by telling him the reason you’re crying was because you thought you weren’t going to see him after this dumpster fire of a day.

Dante silently listens while still comforting you. His presence has honestly helped. He can just be in the same room as you and you’ll instantly feel better. Once you’re done explaining everything Dante pulls your face out of his chest to wipe your tears.

“I’m sorry today hasn’t been a good day for you at all.” Dante thinks how he can try to make it better than the lightbulb in his head goes off. “How about this, I’ll order some pizza and while we wait we’ll go take a hot bath together. After we can eat the pizza while watching a movie. I’ll make sure to even give you extra cuddles.”

He sees you visibly brighten a bit and that warms his heart. If he could, he’d take all your pain away and shoulder it himself. He can’t stomach the feeling of you being upset especially to this extent.

“That sounds perfect Dante.”

He smiles at your reaction and sets his plan in motion. He quickly walks over to the phone to order a pizza. The man on the phone said it’ll be there in about an hour, a perfect amount of time to clean the two of you up and chill in the bath for a bit.

He walks back over to you after hanging up then picks you up bridal style. “Off we go my lady.”

You giggle at his antics and it makes him smile once again. He feels a sense of relief he can still get you to smile and laugh after the shit day you’ve had.

He sets you down on the sink then gets the bath ready. He makes sure it’s nice and warm. He looks over his shoulder to call out to you, “Don’t you have those bath bomb things? Wanna use one of them?”

“Oh yeah! They’re under the sink, let me grab one-“

“Nope! Sit and stay there. I’m doing all the work tonight. You’re just going to sit there and keep looking pretty.”

He walks over to the sink again and bends down to grab the little basket you have filled with bath bombs.

“Okay baby pick your bomb.” He’s silent for a second, “Wow never thought I’d say that.”

You and him both laugh at his little comment. You look through the basket and find a pretty purple one. You grab that one and hand it to him. He takes it then goes and drops it in the bath. You both watch silently as it dissolves. It always is so fun to watch it.

Dante begins to strip once the both is mostly done dissolving. He then walks over to you and picks you back up to place you on the floor. He slowly takes off your wet clothes with them making a flop sound once they hit the ground.

He leads you over to the bath and helps you get in. You leave a bit of room for him so he can slide in behind you. Once he slides in you immediately lean into him. He is also quick to wrap his arms around you and pull you into him.

You two relax silently for a bit. This is really calming. Getting to be in a warm bath with your boyfriend is so comforting. Once Dante feels that you’ve relaxed, he sighs in content. He knows how much you needed this and seeing you enjoy it makes him happy.

After a bit he starts to wash your hair and body. He keeps his touches soft and gentle. Once he’s done washing you he quickly washes himself.

You try to spin around but he prevents you from doing so. “Dante, I could have helped you wash yourself.”

“As much as I would love to have your hands on me baby, tonight is about you. I told you that I you wouldn’t be doing anything but sitting there.”

He pulls you back into his chest and you lean your head on his shoulder looking up at him, “Thank you.” You quietly spoke.

Dante leans down and presses a kiss to your lips. “Anything for you.”

You two sit in the bath until it starts to get cold. You stand up while Dante goes to unplug the drain. He then follows in suit by standing up. He gets out of the bath first and dries off super fast. He holds his hand out to help you out of the bath.

He dries you off just as soft and gently as he did when he washed you earlier. When he’s done the throws the towels in the hamper and leads you to the bedroom. He pushes you to sit on the edge of the bed while he grabs clothes for the both of you.

He comes back dressed with some clothes in hand. He doesn’t hand them to you instead he places them on the bed next to you. He grabs the shirt he grabbed you, which is one of his and puts it on you. He then has you stand, here you stop him though.

“As much as I know you want to help me. Let me put my underwear and shorts on.”

He laughs at your comment and lets you finished getting dressed. He then pushes you back down onto the bed. Which confuses you because the pizza is going to be here soon so you thought you’d be going downstairs.

He then kneels before you and looks at the knee you fell on earlier. He silently looks at it then leans in and presses a kiss to it. You’re shocked by his actions. You were not expecting that at all.

He silently stands up then goes to pick you up bridal style again. You hold on tightly to him as he walks down the stairs and heads to the couch. Just as he places you down there’s a knock at the door.

Dante walks over and opens the door. He hands the man money while taking the pizza. He thanks the delivery man and wishes him a goodnight.

He walks back over to you and places the pizza on the table in front of the couch. “So what movie do you wanna watch?”

“Something we’ve already watched before. I don’t think I can stay up for a new movie.” You say while being cut off by a yawn.

Dante turns on one of the movies you two have watched dozens of times to the point where you two could probably act out the movie. You both eat while watching the movie. You tap out after a couple of slices due to you being so tired.

You lean on Dante and quickly fall asleep. He feels your body relax against his so he knows you fell asleep. He turns off the movie and turns to you. He presses a kiss to your forehead, “I’m sorry today was so bad for you, but I promise tomorrow is going to be so much better.”

He picks you up once and again and carries you back upstairs to his room. He lays you down on your side of the bed and slides in next to you. He pulls you tightly into his body making sure to give you all the comfort you deserve. Dante then checks off the mental to do list he has to do. He will make tomorrow better.

The next morning you wake up with the sun shining. You look over at the clock on your nightstand and see it’s ten a.m. Man you really slept in.

You turn in bed to see Dante missing. Just as you’re about to voice your disappointment the bedroom door opens. You see him walking in with flowers, a box and a bag in his hands.

“Oh perfect you’re up!” He walks over and places the stuff on the end of the bed. He quickly gives you a kiss before stepping back and start explaining everything he bought.

“I wanted to make today better so I went out for a bit. I could tell you were going to sleep in so I woke up early to make sure I got this all done. To start off I went to a couple different stores to find your mascara. Then I found that place also sold bath bombs so I got you some more. On my way back I found a new cafe and got a box of different pastries we could try together. Then get this! There was a florist right next to the cafe so I stepped in there and was instantly overwhelmed. The old lady that worked there could tell so she helped me pick out a nice bouquet for you.”

Dante looks over at you to see your reaction and you’re crying again. Oh no he didn’t want to make you cry. It’s the last thing he wanted to have happen today. “Wait I’m sorry I didn’t mean to make you cry!” He rushes over to wipe your tears again.

You place your hands on top of his that are on your cheeks. “These are happy tears Dante. This is all so incredible. I may have only woke up but today is instantly better. Thank you so much. I love you so so so much.”

Dante pulls you into a soft and loving kiss. “I’m happy that it’s already better. Any time you have a bad day, I’ll fix it. Because I love you so much too.”

@rose-riot-johnson

#dante x reader #dante sparda x reader

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lastofdanny · 9 hours ago

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under your skin | part two

pairing: manny alvarez x f!reader, enemies to lovers

summary: tension fills the air as you and manny struggle with your feelings after the kiss.

a/n: thanks to everyone who read and liked part 1!! ♡ reader is kinda annoying in this and i loved writing manny as a softie (that couldn't be more far from reality lol. why is he so hot???? really like WHY) anyway, i had never written something so long in english before since its not my first language so i struggled a bit w this ending and for that i want to thank @littlemsramirez for the suggestion to the story ! i hope you all enjoy. i have a few other manny fics coming soon, so if anyone has ideas/requests u can send them to me ♡

After the kiss with Manny, everything had shifted. Sure, you hadn’t talked about it. You didn’t really know how to. But every glance, every touch, even the smallest brush of your hands against his seemed to carry a different weight now.

But the worst part? You couldn’t stop thinking about him. And with it came flashes of the first days with Manny: how smug he was when he first introduced himself, calling you cariño before even knowing your name, the way he always found a reason to sit too close or brush past you with that infuriating grin.

You remembered thinking he was the most annoying person you'd ever met — loud, cocky, relentless. But even then, before you’d admit it, part of you had started to look forward to seeing him. Maybe that’s what made it all so confusing — maybe the kiss wasn’t so sudden after all. You couldn’t help but wonder if it had always been something more, something deeper you hadn’t been willing to face.

The thought left you unsettled, and you quickly shook it off. Whatever it was — whatever it had become — you needed to stay away from him before it got even messier.

But the worst part is that Manny wasn’t the type to just let it go.

“Morning, mi amor,” Manny’s voice sounded behind you as you walked into the base one morning. The familiarity of it made you tense up before you could stop yourself. You didn’t even bother turning around, keeping your eyes fixed on the ground as you grabbed your gear.

“I’m busy,” you muttered, trying to keep your voice neutral.

“Is that so?” Manny asked, feigning confusion. “You didn’t look busy when you were staring at the floor there. Maybe you were just thinking about that kiss, huh?”

You clenched your jaw, your heart skipping a beat at the mention of it. You could feel the heat rising in your cheeks, but you refused to let him see it.

Your hand gripped the strap of your bag a little tighter. “You need to stop.”

“Make me.” His words were casual, but the challenge was there, in the way he spoke.

You ignored him, walking away as quickly as you could without running. But as you did, you could feel his gaze on you. As always.

The next few days were an endless loop. You did everything you could to avoid Manny’s teasing, even making a point to take different routes to patrol, staying busy with paperwork or helping others with tasks. But no matter what you did, his words and presence still lingered in the back of your mind.

You could feel the tension between you two every time he was near. It wasn’t just the teasing or the flirtation. It was the unspoken understanding that there was something more. Something neither of you were willing to admit.

"I see you’re trying to avoid me now, huh?" Manny said one afternoon, leaning against the wall as you passed. His voice was light, but the challenge in his eyes was unmistakable.

You gritted your teeth. "And yet, here you are, annoying me again."

He chuckled, and said, "You know, if you want to pick up where we left off, all you have to do is ask."

Days later, the two of you were alone in the woods, in a patrol you tried your best to escape from, but didn't succeed. Manny’s boots crunched behind you, obnoxiously loud on purpose.

“You’re really gonna pretend it didn’t happen,” he said casually, “or are you just waiting for me to bring it up?”

You didn’t turn around. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“That kiss. Y’know. The one where you practically melted into me.”

You shot him a quick look, heart pounding. “Manny, don’t start.”

“Too late.” He picked up the pace until he was at your side, grinning. “I mean, technically, you started it. You’re the one who pulled me in.”

“You kissed me,” you snapped without looking at him. He ducked under it, still talking.

“Oh, sure, but only after you gave me that look. You know, the one like you were two seconds from tearing my shirt off.”

You rolled your eyes. “It was a mistake.”

“Ouch.” He followed, voice dropping into something slower. “Didn’t feel like a mistake. Felt like something you’ve been dying to do for a while.”

You stopped walking. So did he.

“That was just adrenaline,” you said flatly.

He stepped in front of you now, cocking his head. “Right. Adrenaline. Just a little life-or-death make out session. Totally casual. Happens all the time.”

“It’s not a big deal.”

“Then why are you getting all tense every time I get close to you?”

“I’m not tense.”

You scowled, trying to brush past him, but he shifted, blocking your path.

“Just admit that you’ve been thinking about it. About how good it felt.”

You stayed quiet.

“I know I have,” he added, a little softer now. “More than I should.”

Your heart betrayed you with a hard, stupid thump.

“I haven’t,” you lied.

“Sure. Keep telling yourself that. But you're not fooling anyone.”

He leaned in slightly, his voice dropping to a playful whisper.

“Adrenaline, huh? I’ll keep that in mind for next time we’re in a life-or-death situation. Maybe I’ll kiss you again — you know, just to test the theory.”

You stood in front of the roster board the next day, eyes scanning the new patrol assignments. When you saw Derek’s name next to yours, a strange mix of relief and anxiety settled in your chest. The tension with Manny had been building, and switching partners had seemed like the only option to avoid it. But as you stood there, the weight of your decision hit you.

“What’s this? You've got a new partner today, cariño?”

You turned to find Manny walking up to you, his usual grin firmly in place, though this time, there was something sharper in his eyes.

You didn’t answer.

Derek showed up a minute later, all eager confidence. “Hey — guess we’re paired up today. Should be an easy loop.”

“Who put this on the board?” Manny asked, his eyes never leaving you.

“I volunteered,” Derek said. “She wanted to switch.”

Manny’s gaze now flicked between you and Derek, his eyes narrowing just slightly as he leaned in a little, keeping his tone casual but laced with an undercurrent of something much deeper.

“I see. You sure he’s the best choice?” he asked. “I mean, after our... incident the other day, I thought you’d want to spend some more time with me. You know, to work things out.”

Your cheeks flushed at the mention of it, but you refused to look at him. “It’s just patrol, Manny,” you said, a little too defensively.

“Right,” he said, dragging the word out. “Big step. Hope you warned him you have a thing for kissing your patrol partners.”

“Manny.”

“What?” He grinned. “Just trying to keep the new guy informed. Wouldn’t want him getting caught off guard when you lean in all dramatic at sunset or whatever.”

You crossed your arms, your face burning. “Please. It was just a kiss.”

He leaned in slightly, voice dropping just for you. “Yeah. A mistake, I know.. Just adrenaline. But you keep running from it. Are you afraid it might have been more than that, cariño?”

You opened your mouth, but nothing came out. Manny just smirked, straightened, and gave Derek a mock-salute.

“Have fun with him. Just try not to spend the whole time thinking about me.”

With that, he turned and walked off, hands in his pockets — but not before throwing one last glance over his shoulder. That look said everything his teasing didn’t: he cared. Maybe more than he wanted to show.

After the shift ended, you were walking back to the trucks when you heard his voice.

“You’re really doing this, huh?” Manny’s voice had a sharp edge now, and you could feel the weight of his frustration in the air.

You stopped, but didn’t look at him. “Doing what, Manny?”

He stepped in front of you, blocking your path, forcing you to meet his eyes. The tension in his jaw was unmistakable, and his usual easy smile was completely gone. “Acting like I don't exist. Switching partners like it's nothing.”

“You thought I wouldn’t notice?” he pressed, his voice low and edged with something you couldn’t quite place. “You thought I wouldn’t care?”

You swallowed hard, your fingers curling around the hem of your sleeve. You hadn’t expected him to bring it up — not like this, not out here where everything felt too quiet, too exposed.

You swallowed hard. “I didn’t mean-”

“Don’t lie to me,” he said. “You did it on purpose. You’ve been dodging me for weeks. No check-ins, no eye contact. Running away every chance you get. Saying it didn’t mean anything to you, when we both know it did.”

You finally looked up. The hurt in his eyes was worse than the accusation. He wasn’t just mad — he was confused, maybe even a little heartbroken.

“I just thought it’d be easier,” you said, your voice barely above a whisper.

“For who?” he asked. “Because it sure as hell hasn’t been for me.”

Manny stepped closer, his boots scraping the dirt underfoot. “I don’t get it,” he continued, softer this time. “What are you so afraid of?”

“I’m not afraid of anything” you lied, your voice coming out more shaky than you intended.

“Then what is it?” he asked, voice quiet now, like he was waiting for an answer you couldn’t give.

“Nothing!” You said it louder than you intended, but the words came out before you could stop them. “I just... I need space.”

Manny stepped closer, his face softening, but the intensity of his gaze didn’t let up. “I don’t want space,” he said quietly. “I want you. I don’t know how many times I’ll have to say it.”

You took a shaky breath, trying to collect your thoughts, but Manny's eyes, so steady, so unwavering, held you captive.

His hand reached up, fingers brushing your cheek as you felt the warmth of his touch, the tenderness in the movement, and it made your breath hitch. Your heart beat harder, faster, like it was trying to tell you something, something you weren’t ready to hear — or maybe you were just afraid to.

“Manny,” you whispered again, but this time, your voice was softer, uncertain. Your mouth went dry, and you felt exposed in a way that both terrified and thrilled you.

“I know you feel it too."

The air between you pulsed with tension, with closeness, with the weight of every unsaid thing. And then, suddenly, it broke — he leaned in and kissed you.

The kiss wasn’t hesitant this time. It was firm, full of everything he hadn’t said aloud. His hands cradled your face and his mouth moved against yours like he was trying to convince you that whatever you were running from didn’t have to win.

The pressure of his lips became more urgent, more sure. His hands found your waist, pulling you just a little closer, as if he couldn’t bear the distance between you for even a second longer. You couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, caught in the warmth of the moment, the intensity of everything left unsaid.

When the kiss finally broke, your chest heaved, both of you gasping for air. Manny’s gaze softened but didn’t lose that same intensity.

“Let me know when you want to stop pretending,” he murmured, his voice low, almost defeated. “I’ll be waiting.”

Then he turned and walked away, leaving you standing there, the weight of his words settling in the quiet space between you.

The days following that confrontation were long and silent. Manny’s words echoed in your mind, a constant reminder of everything you’d been avoiding. But no matter how hard you tried to ignore them, the reality set in: you couldn’t run forever.

You didn’t see him much after that — the missions kept him busy, and you distracted yourself with your own work, hoping that the distance would somehow make the confusion go away. It didn’t. If anything, it only made the ache in your chest grow sharper.

Then, the message came.

Manny's hurt. He’s not coming back with the rest of the group. When you heard it, all the words you hadn’t been able to say to him came rushing back, and the urge to find him, to make sure he was really okay, was too strong to ignore.

You reached the rendezvous point, your heart pounding as you scanned the area. The place was too quiet, and you felt a spike of panic rise up your spine, but then you saw him — sitting against a rock, looking far too calm for someone who’d supposedly been injured.

His shirt was ripped, a trail of blood ran down his cheek, and a few scrapes marked his arms — but nothing too serious. You crossed your arms, masking the rush of relief with a sharp tone.

“What the hell, Manny? They said you were hurt! What are you doing just sitting here?"

Manny chuckled, not even bothering to get up. “Oh, you know. Just a few scratches. Nothing I can’t handle.” He raised an eyebrow as he looked up at you, clearly enjoying the fact that you were so flustered. “Though I gotta admit I knew you’d come look for me, cariño.”

You felt your heart pound in your chest. “I wasn’t looking for you,” you shot back, trying to keep your composure. “I was just… checking up on you. You know, because they said you were hurt.”

He leaned back against the rock, a cocky smirk on his lips. “Sure you weren’t." He gave you a once-over, his eyes lingering just a little longer than necessary.

“How’d you know?” you asked.

“What?”

“That I’d come look for you.”

“I knew it was only a matter of time til you got tired of running from me. You weren’t fooling anyone trying to push me away.”

“I wasn’t—” You started, but he cut you off.

“Yeah, you were,” he teased, a knowing glint in his eyes. “You’ve been doing it for weeks, pretending like you don’t care. But I could tell. It was written all over your face. Then I’d figured it wouldn’t be long til you came to it.”

You swallowed hard, his words hitting you harder than you expected. He was right.

“I’m sorry,” you said before you could stop yourself. “I didn’t mean to push you away. I just didn’t know what to do.”

Manny raised an eyebrow. “What’s this? A confession? Are you about to pour your heart out to me, cariño?”

“Shut up.”

“Too late,” he murmured. “I’m listening.”

You sighed, the words trembling on your tongue. “I was just scared. Because it all did mean something. It always has. And I didn’t know how to deal with it.”

Manny was quiet for a second, his gaze softening. Then his lips tugged into a slow, teasing smile. “So you do like me. Interesting.”

You groaned, covering your face with your hands. “Can’t you be serious for a second?”

“No, no — this is important.” His voice was weak but playful. “I want to hear you say it. For the record.”

You leaned down slowly, pressing your forehead to his, feeling his breath fan warm against your lips.

“I like you,” you whispered. “And if you ever do something that reckless again without me there to yell at you after, I’ll..”

“You gonna punish me, cariño?”

You raised an eyebrow, your lips curling into a teasing smile. “Maybe.”

He chuckled, “Mmm, I think I’ll take my chances. I’m kind of looking forward to seeing what you have in mind.”

You didn’t answer. Instead, you closed the distance between you and pressed your lips to his, silencing that smug grin in the best way you knew how. The kiss was warm, firm, and laced with everything you’d been holding back. His hand found the small of your back, pulling you closer with a low, pleased hum. When you finally pulled away, his eyes were half-lidded, his smile softer but no less playful.

“Took you long enough,” he teased, his voice light. “But hey, I’m not complaining. About time you realized what I knew since day one.”

You rolled your eyes, but your smile betrayed you. “You’re really proud of yourself right now, huh?”

Manny leaned in just a little, his grin lazy and smug. “Of course I am. I always knew you’d come around eventually. I’m very persuasive.”

“Oh, is that what we’re calling your constant flirting and ridiculous nicknames?”

“Worked, didn’t it?”

He softened then, just enough to let the truth slip through. “I’m also in love with you. In case it wasn’t obvious.”

Your breath caught.

He shrugged, but there was nothing casual in his eyes. “Just putting it out there, cariño. You don’t get to be the only one making dramatic romantic confessions.”

Despite your best efforts to stay annoyed, a smile tugged at your lips. “You’re impossible.”

“To resist, yes” he teased, his lips brushing against your neck.

You sighed dramatically, but your heart betrayed you, speeding up at his proximity. “I guess you’ve got me, then.”

“Good. Cause I’m all yours, cariño.”

tag: @littlemsramirez @sithdaya ♡

#manny alvarez #danny ramirez #tlou season 2 #manny alvarez x you #manny alvarez x reader #danny ramirez x reader #danny ramirez x you #danny ramirez fic #the last of us #tlou fanfiction

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theunsinkableship1 · 2 days ago

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Lukola, the way they are

Lukola the way they are

Disclaimer: This is a Lukola space skip if you don’t believe.

This contains spoilers for the 1973 movie The way we were. If you haven’t seen it, I recommend you watch it and come back later. Once again, this is just pure speculation, one theory amongst many others.

I’ve been deeply immersed in the Lukola bubble for over a year now, and truthfully, it’s been an emotional rollercoaster, intense, unpredictable, and unlike anything I’ve experienced before. Spending so much time thinking about something so niche, so easily dismissed by others as irrational or far-fetched, is very unlike me. I’m not usually the person to fall headfirst into a phenomenon like this. And yet… here I am.

I can’t fully explain why this bond between Luke and Nicola grabbed me the way it did. It wasn’t planned. It wasn’t logical. But it has held me in a kind of emotional chokehold ever since. There’s something that I’ve recognized between them, something real, subtle, and hauntingly familiar. I feel it deeply, even if I can’t quite articulate what it is or why it matters so much to me. It’s a wonder. But I have my guesses.

One of my favorite movies from childhood, one I’ve returned to time and time again over the years. Is The Way We Were. And each and every time it breaks my heart like it’s the first time That film, in all its aching beauty, reminds me of the Lukola situation. In many ways, the dynamic between Luke and Nicola echoes the poignant, bittersweet rhythm of Katie Morosky and Hubbell Gardiner: The longing. The misalignment. The knowing that love exists, and yet watching as it bends beneath the weight of timing, society, fear, and compromise. Like Katie and Hubbell, Luke and Nicola at least in the way I perceive them, carry the glow of something rare and soul-deep, something that perhaps wasn’t meant to bloom under public scrutiny. What if Nicola and Luke were like Hubbell and Katie?

The way we were is a well-known movie, a classic but for those who need a quick reminder, it’s a romantic drama released in 1973 starring Barbra Streisand and Robert Redford. It follows the love story between Katie, a fiercely passionate activist, and Hubbell, a charming but apolitical writer. Despite their intense connection, their opposing values, her fiery idealism and his desire for an easier life, ultimately pull them apart. Set against the political tensions of mid-20th century America, the film explores how love alone isn’t always enough. Its bittersweet ending, where they reunite briefly but realize they can never truly be together, remains one of cinema’s most iconic heartbreaks.

In The Way We Were, when Hubbell and Katie meet at the end, years after their breakup, there’s warmth… but also a wall. Their chemistry is still there, the love is still there, but the timing, the life choices, the world around them, all of it conspired to keep them apart. One of the most heartbreaking parts of that film is the finality of that moment. Katie fixes Hubbell’s hair, a habit she had when they were together, and then they walk away, forever in love, but never to be together again.

In the movie, Katie is all intensity, political, emotional, and passionate. Hubbell is gentler, more passive, a golden boy who loves ease and harmony. When they fall in love, it’s electric, but never simple. Katie sees the best in Hubbell, believes in him, pushes him to be more. Hubbell is drawn to her fire, her belief in something greater, but he also fears it, because it threatens the peace he’s learned to survive within.

The story of Lukola, at least in the eyes of many fans, mirrors that emotional tension. Two people with different energies, caught in something deep, real, and not always allowed to bloom fully in the spotlight.Nicola has often embodied qualities like conviction, advocacy, self-expression, and openness. She's political, articulate, and fearless, not unlike Katie, who refuses to compromise her truth, even when it costs her. Katie is outspoken, impassioned, and intellectually alive committed to justice, expression, and truth, even when it makes others uncomfortable. Nicola can also make people feel uncomfortable not because she isn’t lovable, but because she isn’t predictable. Her humor is sharp, her presence subversive, her intellect disarming. Like Katie, Nicola has often been the more publicly outspoken one: defending her co-stars, advocating for peace in Gaza, women’s stories and trans rights, and embracing the literary and political Her Capricorn Sun gives her ambition and self-respect, while her Virgo Moon offers a detail-oriented emotional world, and her Sagittarius Rising adds boldness, curiosity, and philosophical depth. She is, like Katie, complex and not easily digestible for an industry that often prefers palatability. That Sagittarius Rising explains her outward warmth, wit, and sense of justice, a truth-seeker who is both humorous and expansive in her outlook. Her rising sign speaks to how she leads with energy that feels both fiery and thoughtful, resonating with Nicola's articulate and adventurous presence. Both Katie and Nicola are driven by a kind of fire from within. Whether it’s a creative mission or a political cause, neither can live a shallow life. Loyalty is central to both, once they give themselves, they give completely. But betrayal or ideological misalignment cuts deep. Both can appear composed or stubborn, but beneath that is a longing to be understood, seen, and accepted, as they are. But Katie and Nicola also have fundamental differences. Katie is all openness, all fight, all heart-on-sleeve. Nicola (astrologically with Virgo Moon and Capricorn Sun,) likely processes privately, with emotional caution, she may struggle more with initiating emotional exposure. Katie chooses her ideals over a man. Nicola's potential chart suggests a desire to blend the dream of a stable union with personal freedom.

Luke, on the other hand, feels more careful, image-aware, soft-spoken, and aligned with a system that values presentation. His Leo Rising grants him the natural charisma, charm, and performer’s aura explaining his on-stage or screen magnetism, lush hair, and poised presence. It matches how people are drawn to him: not because he demands attention, but because he radiates a warmth that feels both gentle and royal. Aquarius Sun adds detachment, originality, and idealism, while Leo Rising ties it together with heart and visibility. But the Cancer Moon tempers this with a profound emotional core, meaning he’s more attuned to feeling than his Sun might suggest. It also explains a natural shyness beneath his public charm and an internal tug-of-war between independence and emotional safety. He’s like Hubbell: someone who loves deeply, but who may find it difficult to push back against the expectations placed on him. Both Hubbell and Luke have a magnetic, dreamy quality, and can be elusive in intimate relationships. Both carry a quiet ache, a longing for connection that’s often unfulfilled because they retreat rather than engage fully. Luke’s Pluto and Uranus dominance suggests he is more likely to undergo inner transformation and face darkness, whereas Hubbell avoids conflict. Luke might find strength in evolving through pain, he said he sees himself as less of a pushover than his Colin’s character, whereas Hubbell withdrew into passivity. The Cancer Moon makes him deeply sensitive, emotionally nurturing, and privately sentimental, someone who might hide his truest feelings under a shell of politeness or professional decorum. Hubbell, the All-American golden boy, thrives in a world that rewards simplicity, beauty, and charm. He is a good man, but one shaped by a system that never asked him to question his place in it. Luke, as a Leo rising with a tender Cancer Moon, carries the warmth and magnetism of the golden child archetype. He shines on screen, but there's a deep emotional undercurrent in him that, like Hubbell’s, may be both drawn to and overwhelmed by the intensity of someone like Katie/Nicola.

From Nicola’s perspective, stepping away from Luke, if she ever had to would not necessarily be about a lack of feeling. It might be about the harshness of reality. Being with someone in the same spotlight can feel like sanctuary or suffocation, depending on the day. She may deeply care for him, may have even loved him but protecting herself, her craft, and the life she’s built could come first. Nicola has carved her career through substance, sharp intelligence, and quiet defiance of industry norms. She’s not one to play a role offscreen just to make others comfortable. And if being with Luke, even privately meant being pulled into another orbit, another pace, another expectation of femininity or visibility, she may have sensed that love wasn’t enough to bridge that gap. Like Katie, Nicola could be someone with deeply held values and a fierce inner compass. She might be someone who feels too much and questions everything, while Luke, like Hubbell, could be more at ease in the mainstream, more conflict-avoidant, more inclined to fit than to fight. That difference can create a powerful magnetic pull and also a chasm.

Katie loved Hubbell, but she couldn’t bear to dull her convictions to stay in his world. She straightened her hair, softened her voice, tried to fit in, but in the end, it wasn’t her. If Nicola ever tried to adjust herself, make herself smaller, quieter, more digestible for the sake of harmony, she may have felt that she was betraying something vital.

If Luke is like Hubbell, he may deeply love and admire her, but feel pressure (from career, management, or internalized expectations) to choose a safer, quieter kind of relationship. One that doesn’t challenge the architecture of his public persona. Not necessarily because he doesn’t care, but because he doesn’t know how to fight for love that would require him to change his entire framework. Luke’s Cancer Moon would feel safest in a private, protected love one that doesn’t feel exposed or at risk. But the tension comes from his Aquarius Sun (which craves independence) and Leo Rising (which puts him in the spotlight). He may feel emotionally torn: the heart wants intimacy and protection; the public path demands performance and distance. Luke’s Mars in Virgo is more detail-oriented, cautious, perfectionistic and has a strong sense of duty. While Nicola’s Capricorn Sun and Virgo Moon echo that pragmatic realism, their two Moons (his in Cancer, hers in Virgo) are very different emotionally: she may intellectualize her feelings, while he deeply feels them. There could be tension in how they approach decision-making and conflict.

In both cases, the more emotionally expressive partner is the quieter one (Luke/Hubbell), while the more intellectually vocal partner (Nicola/Katie) speaks what others dare not say.

What makes the Lukola connection so compelling is how their dynamic subtly inverts the roles we see in Bridgerton and The Way We Were. On-screen, Nicola as Penelope plays the quiet outsider who loves deeply and watches from the sidelines, much like Katie Morosky. Colin, like Hubbell, is the golden boy unaware of the depth right in front of him.

But in real life, this dynamic appears reversed. Luke, much like Katie, seems steady, emotionally sincere, and possibly more willing to embrace something real, even if it's difficult. Nicola, on the other hand, resembles Hubbell, charming, admired, and caught between affection and ambition. Like Colin, Nicola is charming, ambitious, and outwardly self-assured. She may be drawn to Luke’s emotional truth while still navigating the expectations of fame, industry circles, and a life where simplicity feels safer than emotional risk. Nicola, in her real-life trajectory, is the rising star, funny, stylish, clever whose charisma naturally places her in the spotlight, yet she may feel ambivalent about vulnerability or romantic entanglements complicating her independence. Like Hubbell, Nicola could be seen as someone from a world that values simplicity, decorum, and upward momentum. She may be torn between the authenticity of a bond like Lukola and the easier public narrative. Like Hubbell, she might fear that love requiring change or compromise could cost her stability or alienate her from those around her.

Like Penelope, Luke has often been perceived as soft-spoken, gentle, and underestimated, but behind the boyish charm, he might hold depth and vulnerability that aren’t immediately visible. Both are observers, often watching from the edges, craving to be fully seen. Like Katie Morosky, Luke seems to love deeply and with conviction once he’s committed. There’s a sense of emotional loyalty, even stubbornness. Luke, too, radiates a quiet steadiness, like Katie, he may want more than the superficial relationship, even if he’s not always permitted to show it. There’s a fire under the calm. A desire to be chosen not just publicly but meaningfully. In Bridgerton, Nicola, as Penelope, is the yearning outsider who loves in silence, much like Katie. In life, Luke may be the one quietly holding space, like Katie, while Nicola navigates the public-facing, “Hubbell”-esque role, complicated by expectations, ambition, and perhaps a fear of disruption.

Their inversion only deepens the mirror effect: it’s not just their characters that resonate, but the way those roles flip in life suggesting a bond that is both cinematic and soul-level.

Nicola is intuitive, emotional, grounded. Luke may lean toward expressing through action or performance (Leo rising), not always verbal clarity. Luke’s Cancer Moon feels deeply and instinctively craves emotional safety and intimacy. When Nicola withdraws, his natural impulse might be to offer care or closeness, which could sometimes feel overwhelming or mismatched if she needs distance. This could lead to emotional misalignment, not from a lack of love, but from different emotional rhythms and coping styles. Misunderstandings could arise if they don’t verbalize emotions directly. Like Luke said in Italy, there needs to be good communication between two friends who fall in love.

Nicola’s Capricorn could want stability, control, and emotional structure. Luke’s Cancer Moon is nurturing, deeply sensitive, and emotionally protective but it can also be guarded, indirect, or withdrawn when overwhelmed. This could easily trigger her fear of instability, especially if she senses emotional retreat or unspoken feelings.

Luke and Nicola come from slightly different worlds. Not necessarily in status, but in tone and style. Nicola’s world is politically alert, inward, often quietly radical. Luke’s is perhaps more polished, performative, and traditional. Families or friends’ disapproval spoken or implied, could have played a role. Sometimes, it’s not outright rejection, but the invisible weight of not fitting into the box you’re expected to occupy beside someone so publicly cherished.

It’s easy to imagine they shared something real. Their intimacy, their comfort, their synchronicity, it reads like more than friendship. Maybe they were together, quietly, away from cameras and chaos. Maybe they talked about everything, scripts, secrets, the kind of future they each wanted. But sometimes, love has to reckon with reality. Different lifestyles, different family cultures, different definitions of “peace” can wear down even the strongest connection. For one, peace might mean stillness, stability, tradition. For the other, it might mean freedom, truth, and refusal to compromise.

And so, like Katie and Hubbell, maybe they loved each other in a deep and wordless way and still chose to part. Not with anger, not with blame, but with the bittersweet grace of knowing it couldn’t work as they were. They may never say it out loud, but some silences speak of a love that couldn’t survive the world but refused to die in the heart.

Your girl is lovely, Hubbell.” Katie says it to Hubbell in the last scene, knowing they’ll never truly reunite, yet still loving him. This famous line could easily echo in a future where Lukola no longer exists in the public eye but continues to haunt both hearts.

Katie and Hubbell’s love was real. So was its impossibility. This is the paradox that lives at the heart of Lukola, a love that feels inevitable yet exists within invisible constraints.

And just like Katie and Hubbell, Nicola and Luke, if their bond ever mirrored their characters, might have found themselves trapped between private truth and public duty between what feels right and what looks right.

This echoes the mirror theory: they feel each other, love each other, and reflect each other, but may not be permitted to join each other.

Timing was everything for Katie and Hubbell. If they’d met a few years later after Hubbell had grown into more of his potential and perhaps developed a backbone for conviction they may have stood on more equal emotional ground.

Katie loved Hubbell for who he could be, not necessarily who he was. That kind of love burns out. Hubbell, meanwhile, never really told Katie what he needed emotionally. If both had stopped idealizing each other and had more honest, vulnerable conversations, they might’ve built a life rooted in reality, in truth as Golda would say, not projection.

Their relationship always teetered on Katie bending or Hubbell retreating. What they lacked was a third space they built together, instead of folding into one another’s. A place where Katie could stay political and active, and Hubbell could still be creative without shame.

Katie wanted the world to change, urgently. But sometimes love means letting people evolve slowly. Meanwhile, Hubbell had to stop being passive and start showing up for the hard parts. If they’d each done a little more work on themselves, without expecting the other to carry the weight, they might have lasted.

If we had the chance to do it all again, tell me, would we? Could we?” sings Barbra Streisand, in “The Way We Were”

Lukola, like Katie and Hubbell, might always carry that question. Did we miss our window? Or was our love always meant to be a brief, breathtaking alignment?

Yet where The Way We Were ends in permanent goodbye, Lukola may still be mid-arc. Luke and Nicola are younger than Katie and Hubbell at the end of their story. There’s still room for growth, return, and reclamation, if courage meets timing.

Katie and Hubbell taught us that love alone isn’t always enough, but that doesn’t make it less real. Likewise, Lukola carries the ache of a connection that might not fit into the shape demanded by a certain part of public life. But that ache is sacred. It teaches. It mirrors.

In their emotional symmetry, supposed slightly political divergence, and unspoken longing, Lukola echoes The Way We Were, a love forged in truth, tempered by timing, and remembered forever in the softest corners of the heart.

Some people fear that Luke and Nicola like Hubbell and Katie might never work together again after Bridgerton, especially if their offscreen bond became complicated or emotionally intense. There’s a quiet anxiety that what once felt so effortless, so collaborative and creative, may now be too charged or too fragile to revisit.

But here’s the key difference: Luke and Nicola are not fictional characters, and this isn’t a script written to break hearts. Real people change. Real people heal. And real collaboration, especially between artists who genuinely respect each other, can take many forms.

Luke and Nicola’s on-screen magic is not common. The way they mirrored, moved together, enhanced each other’s performances, it was layered, nuanced, and organic. That kind of connection isn't something creators let go of easily. Whether they’re close personally or not, their shared understanding of rhythm and emotional storytelling is gold. Professionals know the value of that. And fans aren’t the only ones who see it.

Let’s say just hypothetically that Luke and Nicola did have a deeper bond that complicated things. That doesn’t mean collaboration is off the table. Artists work through far more intense dynamics all the time. Sometimes, distance and growth allow for reunion in new ways cleaner, more stable, even more powerful. If they ever did mean something to each other, that’s not a reason to avoid working together, they already do. In fact, it might be what fuels even more meaningful future projects. I don’t fear that for them. What I fear is an unhappy ending for them.

The Way We Were is a tragedy because Hubbell leaves. Because love isn’t always enough when the world around you won’t bend. Hubbell left because he couldn’t rise to meet Katie’s fire. But perhaps Luke is not like Hubbell. And Nicola is not like Katie. Maybe they are both fires, just learning to burn in the same direction. Or maybe they were once the sun and moon, orbiting in love, and now they are stars distant, but never disconnected. The last scene hasn’t been written. And even if they never share a screen again after Bridgerton, what they gave us, that ache, that truth, that beauty was already more than most actors ever get to give.

But in real life the Lukola story may still be unfinished. Perhaps they loved in the margins. Perhaps they still do. Or perhaps, they’re simply navigating different oceans now but carrying that deep, once-in-a-lifetime recognition in the quiet of their hearts.

And yet: unlike the movie, real life has no final credits, everything is possible until death. The connection, if it was ever real still lives, even if it has changed form. It lingers in glances, silences, what-ifs, and parallel choices.

So maybe Lukola isn’t Hubbell and Katie, maybe they’re the version who, given enough time, find their way back. Or maybe in our wildest dreams, they’re already walking alongside each other quietly, writing their love in invisible ink, until the world is ready to read it.

#lukola #lukolaland

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papathe5th · 2 days ago

Note

I have a Papa V Perpetua X Prime Mover Reader idea (I liked your first one)

Perpetua has been more intense than usual if people get too close to you. But if anyone observes you two from a distance, they can tell how happy the two of you are together.

After a closer look, people noticed that you’re starting to show.

(…yeah, you’re pregnant.)

Thank you for reading and also for submitting this prompt. I ended up delving straight into smut this time around, but there is domestic fluff cushioning their alone time.

READ THE FIRST PART HERE: PART ONE

Papa V Perpetua x Prime Mover f!Reader

Words: 1000

Rating: 18+

At the beginning of the Skeletour, going through Papa V Perpetua’s casual clothes was a comfort. By the end of the North American leg, wearing his old band’s t-shirts had become a necessity.

He loved watching you walk around wearing something of his. You looked and smelled like him, the animal inside his chest swelling with pride and lust. It also growled with possessiveness and paranoia.

“Looking good,” he kissed you behind the ear, wrapping his hands around your waist and placing his palms protectively over your belly. “You wear it better than I do.”

“Papa,” you giggled, glad to have him all to yourself tonight. You’d be sharing his bunk on the second level of the tour bus, and you were already eyeing the deep purple comforter from your seat in his lap. “Is the coast clear?”

“The GTV crew are having dinner,” he whispered in your ear, winding you up. “And I made it very clear we’d be eating together.” His bare lips brushing against the shell made you shiver. “Alone,” his voice reverberated through your entire body, pooling in the puddle in your panties, inside his sweatpants.

Papa could hardly keep his hands to himself when there were eyes on you. And, when he was the only one watching you, there was no escaping his touch.

Five months ago, you used two of the pregnancy tests Mrs. Psaltarian packed for you when it was decided you would join Papa V Perpetua on the road. When they both turned out positive, he fell to knees, at your feet, on the cold tiled floor of the hotel room and praised Satan for blessing you with his Son. You were next to be praised, his arms wrapping around your torso and his lipstick smearing all over your stomach.

“Nobody can know,” he decided, the two of you drenched in blood sweat and tears from the celebratory coitus. “They’ll take you away from me,” he smothered his face between your breasts. “Both of you.”

“Nobody will know,” you kissed the crown of his head. “They’ll have me return to the Ministry. They’d be watching me.”

Five months ago, you swore not to speak a word of it to another soul. Not until the Skeletour came to a close and you could return home. All three of you. Together.

“Looking really good,” Papa placed his chin on your shoulder, peering down at your burgeoning belly. “You’re growing more beautiful each day.” He rolled the shit over your stomach, his hands sliding over and then under it and into the band of the sweats. “Mia Prima.”

“I am growing alright,” you smiled, raising an arm to wrap behind you and around his head. You were going to need a good grip when his own hand makes it between your trembling thighs. “Your Son is making it hard to keep him a sec—OH,” you gasped when a familiar friction took you by surprise even after all this time. You fit him better than his gloves and he glided two of his fingers right inside.”

“I’ll rip out their tongues if I have to,” he grunted, grabbing onto your knee and lifting it on top of his. He needed your legs to be spread so he could fill you all over again. The embrace of your wet walls around his erection drove him wild and tamed the animals all at the same time. And he’ll be feeling conflicted as soon as you come all over his hand . “And the ghouls will help me,” he spoke against the crook of your neck, his canines teasing the flesh he had already torn and had already healed.

The teeth that were thrilling you had threatened to tear open the throats of every crew member that got a little too close to you and the secret you two bore. And the animal that lived in his chest and whose heart longed to protect and provide was the same animal that wanted to possess you completely. It suffocated you,but it also melded you to him, like Eve returning to Adam’s chest. And it also liberated the animal that was caged inside of you, like Eve tasting the fruit of knowledge and rolling in the grass with the Serpent.

“Yes,” you goaded him on, grabbing the curls at the back of his neck and twisting them. “Yes, Papa.” You rolled your hips to meet his fingers, pushed into them as they pumped into you, the melody of your moans splashing against the slick song between your other pair of lips. “Please, Papa.”

“Mine,” he snarled against your skin, wet from his drool and dented by his teeth. “You’re mine,” he declared, the famished animal once again out on the hunt for your body. He will always be hungry for you. “My body. My blood. Carrying my body and my blood.”

Your toes curled and your legs cramped. Your mind went blank and your body went slack. Your soul left you with a scream and he swallowed it whole. He had you in the palm of his hand once again. Mind, body and soul.

“Yours.”

You tasted yourself on his fingers, the pair he had you clean while the other hand soothed your thigh. You couldn’t see much past the stars in your eyes or hear past the drumming of your heart, but you felt you were once again on Earth, in Papa V Perpetua’s lap.

“Mia Prima,” he spoke against your lips, now coated with your own come. “Will you take me inside you?”

His body. His blood. You had already taken him inside you, but it wasn’t enough. You dressed like him, smelled like him and swore to stood by him. It wasn’t enough. He had to claim you over and over and over again.

And you’d let him do it every time.

With your hands wrapping behind you, between your bodies and pushing down his pants, you invite him inside.

#papa v perpetua #the band ghost #ghost #papa v perpetua x reader #inbox #anonymous

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terriblefaun · 1 day ago

Text

𝐅𝐮𝐥𝐥 𝐊𝐨𝐨𝐤 - RAFE/READER

cw. mentions drink, drugs,rafe lowk being a lil softie in this chapter, jj angst, mentions r having a bad home life. SLOW BURN. more set up than story atp. lots of f word! from the uk i cant help it x

3.7k words. part 1/? (had to divide it up cos the whole thing was killing my phone! so lmk if u acc want the next one !! <3) also not proof read! love u xx

It was the third time that morning that JJ had brought it up. You hadn’t hung out properly for ages since you moved and still it was all he could go on about. Pope had been kind enough to jump in at one point, making sure to tell you that he didn't think of you any different. Which you had appreciated, but that was about as brave as anyone got when it came to standing up to JJ or defending you.

Without Kie here you were playing 3:1 and losing bad.

John B, shyly at first and then with a confidence that surprised you, agreed with his best friend. “You are a little different now that you live on the Eight, i mean, for one: you're late all the time-”

“-Cos it takes me forever to get here!”

“-And, like, that kook fit you always wear…”

“My uniform?” You huff, exasperated. It really was pointless to argue but for fuck sake, surely you’d put up with it for long enough? It was summer, you'd come to JB’s for a little escape, a little friendship and a cold beer, but you’ve been here two hours already and all anyone had talked about was that damn kook academy, how it was going to change you- how it had already changed Kie. Like that was the worst thing in the world.

JJ opened his mouth to say something but you cut him off, “Can you just shut up? Please just fucking shut up about it already. You're going on and on and its driving me fucking crazy, J. Just stop.”

It was clear this pissed him off, but his face softened from anger to offense, and then finally to a sarcastic smile. “Fine, whatever the princess wants.”

“Oh, you're such a p-” but you stopped yourself with a tired laugh. You didn't want to fight. Not again, not now. You were still exhausted from the last one - the one that ended with Kie crying and walking home alone, despite you going after her. You hadn't heard from her since.

“What? Pogue? Is that what you were gonna say, huh? I’m such a fucking pogue!”

“Piece of shit, Jayj! I was gonna call you a fucking piece of shit! Cos you are! You can't just be happy for me can you-”

“Happy?” JJ asks like you really are out of your mind, like he can't even begin to imagine a silver lining to this situation.

“Yeah, cos Kie’s finally getting along with her mom again, and for the first time in my life i don't have to worry about making rent payments or where the hell my mom is and i finally have a step dad that doesn't fucking hate me! Can you just think about that for a fucking minute, JJ, can you really not image why that might be of some relief to us? Huh?”

He doesn't say anything, which might actually be worse.

Your eyes had started to sting with tears and you turned away from your friends to hold your face in your hands. It was hot to the touch and your head hurt. You really didn't want to start crying.

Pope and John B were sat quietly on the sofa like two kids waiting for the parents to stop arguing. Why weren't they saying anything? Is this really how they all felt- like you weren't theirs anymore? Like you had betrayed them somehow?

You snivelled, sighed and turned to look JJ in the eyes. Despite the tugging at his heart, he refused back down.

It pissed you off to see him still standing there with his shoulders squared and a hard look on his face. He was so far from the boy you were used to, the soft, funny one you had grown up and felt safe with. How do you even get back to that? Really, you knew the answer was to say sorry, but like hell that was gonna happen. Despite the fact you had nothing to apologise for, you were cursed with the same stubbornness as he was. You were two juuls in a pod, or whatever the saying was.

And then, a thought. A terrible, mean thought.

“You’re just jealous, that's it.”

There's a sudden look on JJ’s face that you've never seen before. It scares you almost enough to back down, but you stay tough. He laughs.

“Such a fucking kook thing to say i mean, c’mon!” JJ gestures to Pope and JB like they're gonna agree with him- and if given the chance to talk, they might but you don't dare to look over, just in case. “Yeah. Of course I'm jealous of you, princess. Jesus Christ, man, you’re so self absorbed! You fit right in with those dickheads on figure eight, you know that? You and kie, you're right where you belong.”

“You’re such a dick.” You swallow down all that venom you had just a minute ago, it stings, makes your vision blur.

“Cos’ i’m telling the truth?" He says, "Just go home YN, fuck off back to the eight already ‘cos we don't want you here.”

“JJ-” Finally someone chimed in, though you couldn’t tell who, probably Pope again, but it didn’t matter anyway, right now there was no one else in the world except for you and JJ.

“I don’t want you here.” He says again in a low voice. Then, turning away, mumbles something you probably weren't actually meant to hear. Something sarcastic about your dad, how proud he'd be of how you're turning out.

You gasp. A direct hit, one you never expected he'd go for. The boys look up at you, not having caught it themselves.

But you had heard it. J saw you hear it. And it hurt. And he saw that it hurt. And he didn't seem to mind. He had the sense to look guilty for a split second but then there was that stubbornness again, mean and cold.

You stood there with your mouth open for a minute. Half waiting for him to rush out an apology, to call a time out like this was just a game you could stop playing and forget all about, and you could go back to how things were supposed to be.

JJ said nothing.

Fine. You storm off, slamming the chateau doors behind you and heading straight for your bike. It's a little vintage thing with a basket and ribbons, and you feel just a little ridiculous as you cycle angrily away. I’ll show you a fucking kook princess.

Grand exit now complete, the adrenaline of whatever the hell just went down finally wears off halfway through town. Collapsing onto the sidewalk, tangling with your bike as you go down, you let yourself cry.

Not entirely sure how long you let yourself fall apart but time starts moving again when a car pulls up in front of you. The window rolls down and you look up at the sound of Bunny Wailer’s Mellow Mood coming from the speaker.

“Need a ride?” The driver shouts over the music.

“Kiwi. Where the hell have you been? I’ve been calling!”

“Sorry. Don’t cry about it,” she smiles, i am sorry, and nods towards the passenger side, “get in.”

The warmth of the midday sun had dried your tears pretty quick, but your eyes were red and puffy and gave you away. Oh, YN. Kie mumbles once you're inside, turning the radio down and leaning across to hug you.

“Don’t worry, it’s Jay that's made me cry, not you.” You choke out a wet laugh and pull your hoodie up over your face for a second. “I’ll be fine in a minute, really, i’ll be fine.”

She sighs decidedly, giving you a once over. "Nah, i know what you need.”

You side eye her, unsure. "Kook party." She explains and you cringe. Sarah, a friend Kie had already made at the academy, had invited her and in turn she was inviting you. As if I'd wanna be there without you.

"C'mon. Big house, free booze, no JJ."

"OK. Sold."

Kiara’s bedroom is likely to be your favourite place on earth, though you never get to spend a lot of time there as it also happens to be one of her least favourites. You don't even know what it is that makes it so great, her bed is soft and plush but too small for two, so sleepovers are always spent uncomfortably squished between her, her plushies, and the wall. And the only CD’s she has are reggae, which you don't mind, and indie rock shit you've never heard of and can't stand.

Maybe it was just because her house was so totally not yours. Maybe that's why you liked it.

You’re in front of her bathroom mirror, chewing on your bottom lip, brows furrowed and arms crossed when Sarah comes up behinds you to ask what you're thinking. “I think…. I need to go blonde.”

Her eyes light up, “Like Buffy Summers Blonde or-”

“-Baywatch blonde.”

“Baywatch blonde…” she repeated in a whisper, an excited smile on her face. “Dude, yeah. That'd be so hot.”

She let out an excited squeak, and that was that. The make over was immediate. You dyed your hair then and there in Kie's en suit. Then she picked out an outfit while Sarah did you make up. Pamela Anderson or...Jennifer Aniston? she had asked.

"Which ones more kook?" Aniston was decided upon, though with the bikini you'd borrowed from Kie and the short denim skirt and black cami you wore, you ended up a bit more Pamela anyway.

It's gonna be rager, said Sarah, It’s at Alice’s boyfriend’s friend’s beach house, or something like that. Kiara seemed to know all these people already, so you nodded and smiled and pretended you did too.

"I have to go home quick, you know, put a bag together, let my mom know i'm still alive."

"You want us to drop you off?" Sarah had asked, sweet as she was you could tell she wanted to stay playing dress up for a while longer, so you declined.

"Just text me the address, i'll meet you there."

To no surprise at all, your mom wasn’t home. You thought best not to leave a note or text her, lest she remember she had a daughter and suddenly decide to parent it.

You went up to your room on the top floor and put together a bag. Perfume, lip gloss, $50, a rollie and some gum. The essentials. You dug out the half empty tequila bottle you and kie kept tucked away in your pj drawer, and poured out a shot for yourself. Then another. Cheers, you thought, to going full kook.

9:15 PM and you were out the door, instantly regretting your choice to meet them at the party- having to cycle there on your bicycle in the worlds shortest denim skirt was not the most comfortable experience. But alas, you looked as good as you felt, and it might have been the tequila but you felt pretty fucking good.

Kiwi where are you??

KIE!!!! im here. they have jello shots where r u

i cant fudnd u guys anyebere

KIARBRA!!!!!!!!!

You'd been at the party for little over an hour, far too drunk already but having a great time. Despite not yet having found Kie or Sarah. You had, however, recognised a few girls from the academy and most of them had recognised you too, despite your new hair and new found friendliness towards them, they knew you.

Another half an hour of slurred compliments and dizzy dance moves and you begin to feel the alcohol wear off, a tragedy that must be remedied if you're to socialise with these people any longer. How much longer? Where the fuck was Kie?

You’re making your way through the kitchen towards the back yard in hopes of somewhere quiet to call your friend, when a figure steps out in front of you. “You look like a malibu and coke kinda girl, right?”

He seems nice enough, towering over you but not making you feel trapped. He’s got a polo shirt on, clearly recently ironed, and a big drunk smile on his face. Am I a Malibu girl? You thought, that’s rum, right? What the hell, sure.

“How could you tell?”

“Sweet girl like yourself, how could it be anything else?”

Sweet. That's something you haven't been called before. It makes you feel a bit soft in the middle, clearly a line, but working on you nonetheless. “Oh, I like you.”

His smile widens, eyes almost closed, and goes to speak again but is interrupted by another mystery boy before he can reply. “Is this guy bothering you?” He says, slow and deep with a cocky smile, one arm slung over the first guys shoulder. He looks at you, leans in close like he’s telling you a secret. “Sorry ‘bout my friend Top here, S’like a puppy, not been properly socialised yet.”

“Hey thats- I was just offering the new girl a drink.” He says, holding up a red solo cup with what you assume is a malibu and coke inside.

“Allow me.” Says the second guy, taking the cup from Top’s hand and offering it to you.

“Thanks-” You laugh, half forgotten by the boys already. You look between them as they go back and forth with each other, a drunk scene clearly played many times before, and take a sip of your drink. God. Yeah, Definitely rum.

"You shouldn't encourage them." A soft voice says. Where had he come from? had he been here the whole time?

"I'm sorry?"

"They're like strays," he explains, nodding towards the boys, "show 'em a bit of attention and they'll just keep coming back."

You turn to face him completely. He's gorgeous- clearly knows it too- but the spot lights of the kitchen make halos around him. He copies your movement and only then do you realise just how close he's standing.

“Rafe.” He offers after a long moment of you saying nothing. “Rafe Cameron.”

You stop your drooling and straighten up.

“Cameron?” Why did that sound familiar? A smug smile creeps onto his face and you watch it drop comically fast as you ask your next question. “Sarah's brother? Oh, shit, have you seen her?” You ask, looking around, but it’s Boy 1 that answers.

“S’not here,” Top sighs, suddenly drawn back into the conversation. “Something about… baby turtles or something, i don't know.”

“You know my sister.” Rafe says to you, ignoring Top.

“Yeah, well, kind of. Not really. I was supposed to meet her here.”

“Well…she’s not here,” Rafe tilts his head with a smile and watches you think. Great, so I've been ditched. Double ditched. Bitches. He thinks you look a little offended, but not altogether disappointed. His little smile grows, plotting. “-but i can take care of you.”

You look up at him in all his 6’3 sun kissed glory. He’s standing close enough that you can smell his aftershave, the bitterness of whatever he’s been drinking, and the faintest smell of sunscreen applied hours ago. The thought of him putting on suncream at all makes you smile. You watch the way his shirt stretches around his bicep as he leans on the counter behind, the way his hand dwarfs the red solo cup it holds, the way his eyes blink slow and steady, lashes kissing his cheeks.

“Yeah, I bet you can.”

“She said she likes me.” Top chimes in, previous Sarah related heartbreak forgotten.

“Topper, you're drunk, just… go find Sarah.” Rafe says, grabbing him by the shoulders and pointing him in some other direction. Boy 2 is tugged along behind by some invisible string, and off they go looking for Sarah.

“Let me know if you find her!” You shout after them, Boy 1 turns, salutes in your vague direction, and then disappears in the crowd of other drunk polo shirt wearing kooks.

Rafe turns to you, shrugging his shoulders with a smile that dimples his cheeks, “Looks like it's just us.”

You click your tongue. “I was actually on my way out.” Why am I playing hard to get?

“Oh, you don't wanna do that.”

“No?” Tell me to stay and I will.

“Nah,” he starts, drawing out the words quiet and slow, “You wanna stay here with me allll night.”

Thank you. But instead you say, “Here? With you? All night?” is a voice thats sweetly mocking. The apples of your cheeks turn pink with a grin. You down the contents of the cup Top had given you, trying your best not to scrunch up your face, “Well you best get me another drink then.”

He takes the cup from you without breaking eye contact. Was he always so intense with it? Paired with the barely visible but constant grin he’d had this entire time, you worried maybe he could read your mind. Your eyes shot down to his hands again. Please god don't be reading my mind.

“I’ll be back in a minute. Don't go anywhere.” You look up at him through your lashes, giving him your best Jessica Rabbit, which seems to be working.

“I’ll be right here.”

You turn to leave, pointing quick to the plastic cup, “-No Malibu!”

The bathroom door was unlocked, which is why you surprised to find it occupied by three girls huddled around the counter. “Oh, sorry-” you turn to leave but have already caught their attention, one reaches out to you in a instant.

“YN!” She slurs out, looking up at you through lidded eyes. It’s one of the girls youd danced with earlier- Lacey or Lexi or something. Whoever she is, theres a smile on her face that lets you know she’d totally wasted. Not just drunk either.

“Did I see you talking to The Rafe Cameron out there?” She squeals, drawing the attention of the other two girls. A couple of ‘oh my gods’ are whispered as they huddle around you, desperate for more information.

“I Just-”

“Is he a good kisser?”

“I Don’t-”

“Are you gonna hook up with him?”

You bark out a laugh. “Fuck, girls, I only just met him!”

“So? Are you?” They continue to pester, unfazed and looking up at you with shining, excitable eyes, like kids on christmas morning.

You're smiling hard and trying to think of something to say. Fuck it, lets go with honesty. “Maybe, yeah.”

They squeak again and they grab at you, pulling you towards the bathroom mirror. One girls hand goes straight to your hair, curling a single piece with her finger, neatening it up the best she can. Another reaches for her bag, the clatter of makeup can be heard as she fumbles. She comes at you then with a powder brush. They’re all talking over each other and it's hard to make out exactly what is being said by any of them. I knew a girl that slept with him once/i heard he cant get it up unless you call him mr cameron/really cos amy said-

It’s then that you see the thin white lines of powder neatly waiting on the black marble counter. Ah, you think, well that makes sense.

Rafe is standing outside the bathroom when you open the door, he pushes himself off the wall casually like you haven't just kept him waiting entirely too long. His eyebrows raise as you step out with three girls following very close behind. They're all giggles and lazy grins and so are you.

“...Are you high?” You bite your lip to keep from smiling.

Tsk tsk tsk. “I leave you alone for five minutes and you get high. I can't take you anywhere.”

“I wish you would take me somewhere...” You say, confusing yourself, and then “isn't it so hot in here?”

“Right." He laughs, "Outside.” But he’s already reaching for your hand when he says this. He’s gentle, not like the girls in the bathroom had suggested. He’s leading you off towards the big patio doors, red plastic cups forgotten on a side table somewhere behind you. You plod along next to him, doing as you're told.

You couldn't even guess how long you'd been sat out in the garden with him. Forever, maybe. You mumble out a thank you, trying not to sound embarrassed. Mostly you just felt bad for him being on babysitting duty. If only Kie was here.

“S’fine. Happens to most people the first time they try blow.” You don't even attempt to protest, just laugh. Your cool girl exterior was screwed the second he had introduced himself. Your makeover had been great, blonde bombshell of your dreams, unfortunately you were still yourself underneath it all. Which isn't to say that you were insecure, or shy, just that you had always folded far too easily for a pretty face. And Rafe had a very pretty face.

And to his credit, or maybe to yours, he didn’t seem any less interested in you now that you were both sobering up, significantly less cool and mysterious but still beautiful.

You're lying on the grass when he asks, “So…are you gonna tell me your name or what?”

Ha! Looking up at him from where he stands over you, you smile sweetly, like you hadn't just spent ten minutes trying not to vomit on his shoes, like you're meeting him for the very first time, “YN.”

Rafe repeats your name quietly to himself like he’s trying to figure something out. “Do I know you?”

You smile, “I don't think so. Not really.” to be fair, he and jj happened to rarely pick fights when you were around, and he was older than you by maybe two or three years, you weren't sure, so it's unlikely your paths would have crossed outside that.

“Mhm. not really, huh? Do I get a hint?”

“No.”

He sighs, thinking like you gave him a clue anyway. “You definitely live on the island?”

“All my life!” You say, accidentally playing along. Sobering, but not sober.

“I don't know…” He bends down next to you, one hand reaches out to tuck a piece of hair behind your ear, it lingers there and you try your best not to lean into it, fail miserably, and look up at him. “I think i’d remember this face.”

You blush, he probably notices but you tilt your head back and close your eyes. Embarrassed, yes, playing it cool, maybe. You bite your lip to keep from smiling too wide. “Apparently not.”

He laughs. Damn, Definitely noticed the blush. “Seriously, how can I not have met you before?”

While this was fun, you were drunk. And when you were drunk there was always a silly voice in the back of your head telling you sad things. Right now it was telling you how disappointed he was going to be when he found out who you were- or rather, what you were. A pogue. “I don't wanna play anymore.”

“No?” He asks, a little condescending, like he was talking to a child, but there was something about it that you liked. You shake your head ever so slightly, no.

“Want to go home?” The question surprises you. Were they your only options, play nicely or get sent home? No, you shake your head again.

“So then do as you’re told.” He says softly, testing the waters. He stands, taking your hand and you let him pull you up with him. There's a moment where you're pressed against his chest, and he’s looking down at you, his eyes dark under the moonlight, where you think he might kiss you. And maybe he would have if you’d have been good.

For the first time in your life you desperately want to be good.

“Let’s go.” It seems you're being let off with a warning. You take a deep breath, closing your eyes as Rafe leads you down the side of the house and into the front yard, unlocking his car.

#rafe cameron #rafe cameron x reader #rafe outer banks #rafe x reader #outerbanks rafe #rafe fanfiction #rafe x you #rafe obx #rafe fic #obx fanfiction #obx fic #obx x reader

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dark-lord-of-awesomeness · 14 hours ago

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Hey, I don't know if this is already on that ever growing list of cat shorts, or if you feel up to adding to it, but mabye a version of the chapter 54 multi- ford, but with Bill wins Stan and Ford instead?

I was interested in this one for a while because i was interested in how the fords would react to each other, but thought it would probably be similar to the original so didn't ask. But for some reason it kept bugging me.

The reason hit me suddenly earlier today. Sure, how the other ford's reacting to bill wins Ford compared to cat Ford might be interesting, that's not the most interesting part.

It's how Bill wins Ford would react to the situation that's much more interesting and probably different.

I mean, for one, I'm not sure Bill would even try to contact this world in 2012. Ford stabbed him, so many times. If I were Bill I'd pass on that one unless it's revenge related. But he might.

Either way, this is a Ford that probably still walks with a Lazer gun, has unicorn hair sewn into both his and Stan's and probably the kid's clothes now too.

No matter that he has no translator, and that it's probably obvious with just a bit of observation he hasent been through the portal. Even though there are feral and battle scarred fords in the same room.

You can't tell me he wouldn't see something even remotely related to Bill, much less a Bill warlock, and that he wouldn't be the only Ford there to immediately lose all cool and go for the throat.

I can add it on! He'd definitely an interesting Ford.

Although I think the best version of multi Ford with Bill wins ford would not have Stan there at all. If Stan's there he can keep Ford mostly level and stable, as he's his designated emotional support cat. Ford might get snappy and hovery, but mostly just very twitchy and suspicious with everyone. Any Ford who's first reaction to Bill is violence can be explained away as normal if more severe Ford Bill truama.

Bill wins ford who gets shoved into the multiverse with no Stan there to either keep him calm or at least explain the situation would immediate go off the deep end again. He's full on tackling people here, desperately screaming for Stan and looking for awnsers how he got into the multiverse and how to get back to his home dimension. The moment he's left to his own devices he's stripping the walls for parts and restarting his weapons manufacturing, as he keeps emergency unicorn hair on him at all times.

The bill cultists opens the door to give him a translator and Ford is already going for the jugular. Doesn't care about freeing the other Fords he's on a one man quest to kill everything Bill related and find his Stan. Because obviously his Stan must be around here somewhere! Otherwise he's back at home alone and away from ford where Ford can't protect him!

Which is exactly where Stan is.

Cue maniacal laughter as Ford loses it. Again. Only comes back for the other Fords because theyre him and they must know how to get back right? Right? And if they don't then what even is the point of them?

So look forward to Ford loses it part 2: the multiverse.

#gravity falls #gravity falls au #cat stan #stan pines #ford pines

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poetry-protest-pornography · 2 days ago

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Don't mind me, just thinking about Robby's need to maintain control of his feelings -- and most importantly of how he is perceived to be in control -- and how he turns to his beleaguered faith when that control slips, fails, leaves him feeling every place he's ever been broken. How he pushes and pushes himself, and puts everything he has into his job. How he has to table his pain and his grief -- and then his fear and sympathy for his not quite stepson -- in order to keep giving.

Thinking about Langdon and his deep seated need for Robby's approval, to prove himself worthy, to be right -- but most especially to be trusted and needed. How he finds real joy in learning and teaching, and the way his fear grows through the day and crescendos in anxiety driven angry words in direct contradiction of his best interests. How much of his sense of self is wrapped up in being a doctor, being needed and trusted.

Thinking about McKay, and how her love for her son has pushed her through this hellish day, and how much of herself she gives to her job, and how her guilt and anger follow her. How she lets herself see her reflection in her patients, and how that dictates how she treats them and how she teaches.

Thinking about Dana, and how much of her life is in that ER. How much every person on staff needs her, and how long she's let being needed keep her there, even as it takes pieces from her. How much she struggles with the idea of walking away from the people who rely on her.

Thinking about Mohan, and the confidence she found through kindness, and having that kindness recognized and praised. And then having to find it again through a traumatic event that didn't give her time to take. How her compassion guides her care, and how she starts to trust herself more and more.

Thinking about Collins, and how she got to start the day with quiet celebration, and suffered a terrible loss in the middle, and had no time to grieve or to feel her pain. Who had to sideline her loss through counseling a girl through an abortion, and lead a woman through a difficult delivery. How she still treated her patients, and taught other doctors, and remained in control until she was forced (and gently coaxed) into confronting it. How she finally let herself accept comfort, and prioritize herself.

Thinking about Mel, who is so compassionate even as she struggles with some social cues; she catches things and people that others miss. How she has latched onto Langdon and the way that he listens to her, and how he is so impressed with her, happy to learn from her, and how that helps her to grow into herself in this place.

Thinking about Santos, who is so eager to get into the dirty, difficult parts that she doesn't bother with the part where she pays attention to establishing relationships with the people around her, but through the mask of indifference, she cares so much, and that's what drives her to push the boundaries of her position (and to report Langdon), and eventually reach out with kindness -- to her coworkers, and her patients.

Thinking about Whittaker, and how he started off having basically the worst possible day, but ended with newfound confidence (Another year before you can call me Doctor vs Hi, I'm Dr Whittaker). How he got to be the one who Robby needed, after needing so much reassurance from him at the start. How he is so far from home, and living in an abandoned part of the hospital, and doing this all on his own, but now he's not alone.

Thinking about Jivadi, and how she started the day wanting no association with her mother and struggling with the realities of people bleeding and suffering in front of her, and ended it telling her mom off for assuming her ignorance, and acting to care for patients with sure hands.

Thinking about Abbot, and how he started the day literally on the edge, letting himself be talked down by his best friend, and had to end it back there, on the edge, returning the favor of reminding Robby that they both have too much to do to end it. And how he got to walk off that rooftop, and go to the park, and drink and commiserate with some of the only people that understand what it's like to stand on that ledge.

Anyway, I finished The Pitt and I'm in pain.

#the pitt

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homemadesterekpie · 2 days ago

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this post is inspired by this Steter edit but this is NOT a Steter fic/post. this is entirely Sterek but if you enjoy Peter terrorizing Stiles then this is for you too lol

(tw for threats of rape, threats of murder, violence)

Evil Peter having Stiles cornered and taunting him and threatening to kill all of his friends even threatening to kill his father but Stiles standing strong until Peter inclines his head to one side with crazy eyes going on and a smirk forming and then he threatens to kill Derek and watches as Stiles loses his composure.

Stiles starts shaking and he’s like you wouldn’t! he’s your family. but Peter’s smirk widens and he laughs as he says, you love him.

the words hit Stiles like a slap to the face and he knows he’s fucked. he starts crying and begging Peter not to hurt Derek.

Derek is strong but Peter is crazy AND strong and the idea of Derek not surviving Peter sends him into near hysterics.

Peter just watches him as he begs for Derek’s life, enjoying every second of it.

He strolls closer to the boy and relishes as he scrambles back into the wall in fear. With no where to go, he can’t stop Peter from leaning down, his lips to his ear. Stiles’ entire body shaking with fear and revulsion at the closeness.

Peter asks if Derek loves him too, that if he calls him and tells him he has Stiles here like this, would he come running? would he come to rescue his small little human? If he does, he says he will make Stiles watch as he tears Derek apart and then he’ll claim Stiles in his dying blood and give him the bite.

Something breaks in Stiles’ mind and suddenly he can’t breathe, strangled sobs bubbling up his throat but he can’t breathe.

He crumbles to the ground wheezing for breath, tears streaming down his face. He can see it, what Peter said he would do, he can see it crystal clear in his mind and he tries to tell Peter not to call Derek, to leave him out of this but he still can’t breathe. His face is numb and black spots appear in his vision and he knows he’s going to pass out any second.

Suddenly Peter grabs him by the collar and backhands him hard before letting him fall to the ground again.

Finally, air fills his lungs and he can breathe but with air comes the sobs. He’s sobbing so hard his body shakes with the force of it. It’s hard to speak but he makes himself say something.

He crawls at Peter’s feet and begs him to leave Derek alone, to leave him out of this, that he would do anything, he’ll let Peter have him, he’ll let Peter claim him and give him the bite, just to please please leave Derek be.

As much as Peter loves the sight of the pathetic boy begging at his feet, the idea of having his nephew here too to toy with is too appealing to resist. So he leans down to grab the boy’s jaw in a hard grip, claws digging into his delicate skin, the smell of his blood tantalizing to the wolf’s senses and tells the boy, no.

It takes a few seconds for Stiles to register the simple word but when he does all the fight goes out of him. His entire being goes numb and when Peter lets his jaw go, scratching it in the process, the rest of his body hits the ground hard.

He watches numbly with his cheek on the cool ground as Peter walks away a few paces, taking out his phone. He distantly hears the sound of the camera snapping a few times. A few seconds later the phone rings and he’s answering it, greeting his nephew with fake warmth.

Stiles just blinks away stray tears. He can’t move, it’s like his mind has decided to take a vacation. He’s here but not really. Derek was going to die because of him then Stiles would die too because Peter was too crazy not to tear him apart in the end.

Peter would rape him and bite him and in his crazed fervour he would tear Stiles apart, mauling him to death. That’s probably what he deserves. He can’t even do this one thing, keeping one person safe, not even himself.

The last thing he hears before blackness engulfs him is a familiar and loud, ground shaking, roar.

~*~

In the end, Derek kills Peter. His wounds are serious but not life threatening and they’re healing rapidly. He takes Stiles to the hospital even though Stiles says he’s fine. Just some bruises and scratches. He’s strangely quiet though. Derek drives him home after, the sheriff working a double shift and Stiles begged the staff not to bother him.

Stiles thanks him for the lift but he turns off the Camaro’s engine and follows Stiles inside. Stiles lets him, doesn’t have the energy to argue with him.

He knows Derek is watching him closely. He can feel his eyes on him, looking for something. He doesn’t know what and right at the moment he doesn’t care.

Stiles rummages in the fridge for the gallon of milk and pours himself a giant glass before downing it in one go. He knows where his dad hides the hard liquor but he won’t be caught dead coping with alcohol even though he really wants to right now.

That itself kind of scares him because he’s fine. Peter didn’t even do anything. Yeah, he slapped him around a little and scared the shit out of him but apart from that, he didn’t do anything. So, why does he feel like the sky is falling down.

Annoyed with himself he puts the milk back and rinses his glass and makes his way to his room, Derek hot on his heels.

He grabs his things to take a shower and gestures vaguely at his room to Derek, letting him know to just do whatever.

He takes a long time in the shower, the water scalding hot and he’s scrubbing and scrubbing until his skin feels raw. He swallows down the ball of emotions at his throat before finishing up and finally getting out.

He catches his reflection in the mirror as he’s getting dressed for the night. There’s a dark bruise blooming under his eye and on his cheek, the one Peter had backhanded hard. He’ll definitely get a black eye on top of a giant bruise to his cheek. There’s also scabs forming at his jawline, where Peter’s claws had dug in and scratched. All in all, he looks like shit. No wonder Derek can’t seem to leave him alone. He must be waiting for Stiles to drop dead or something.

Speaking of Derek, he’s sitting at his desk chair when he goes back to his bedroom. Stiles shuffles around a little awkwardly before telling him he’s going to bed. Derek just looks at him, lifting an eyebrow as if to say okay? do so?

Stiles sighs in defeat and turns off the lights and goes to bed. Once again, he’s too tired to argue with him. It takes a bit of time for Stiles to relax though since he has the awareness of Derek sitting in his room, watching him but eventually he does and he falls asleep.

He has a nightmare, images of what Peter said he would do to him and to Derek flashing in his mind over and over. Peter slicing his claws deep into Derek’s chest, smiling madly at Stiles. Peter holding him down beside Derek’s dead body, ripping his clothes off, his naked skin sliding in the red blood as Stiles screams and screams and then he’s awake and he’s still screaming.

Red eyes flash and he’s pulled into a strong chest and it’s Peter, somehow he came back to life and he killed Derek and now he’s going to rape Stiles and he’s going to tear him apart too, so he struggles against the hold on him, at the grabbing hands, still screaming.

Then a different voice than Peter’s reaches him (It’s me, Stiles! It’s me, wake up!), a different scent. Woodsy and musky, entirely Derek. He stops struggling and screaming, frozen in place. Derek is holding his arms and watching his face with a deep look of concern. He asks Stiles if he’s okay.

Stiles’ lips wobbles, a dam seems to break and he starts sobbing uncontrollably. Derek lets him go, instead pulling him back into his embrace, arms tight around his shaking form.

He cries and cries into Derek’s chest, gulping in his scent and savouring his warmth. Derek starts rocking gently and making a soothing rumbly sound. Stiles takes it all in and lets it all lull him until his sobs have died down and the feeling of safety is overpowering anything else.

That’s when Derek asks him what did Peter say, what did he do? If Stiles wasn’t feeling so safe in this moment he wouldn’t have told him. But here in Derek’s arms, somehow he feels safe, so he does, he tells Derek everything, then he tells him what the nightmare was about.

Derek listens to him silently, still rocking them gently. When Stiles is done talking, Derek apologizes to him which makes Stiles frown and look up at him. Derek tells him should have prevented it. He should have picked up on his obsession. Stiles just shakes his head into his chest and says that Peter was crazy, it’s not worth thinking over.

Then Derek softly promises that no one will ever hurt him again, making Stiles’ heart stutter in his chest. He looks up at Derek again and searches his face for a few moments. He looks down at Stiles like he’s dead serious so Stiles just says that he can’t make a promise like that but he can’t help the way the words makes him feel. Soft and vulnerable and so hopeful.

Derek’s eyes flash Alpha red and he says that yes he can because he’s the Alpha now. Stiles has no choice but to believe him.

#that steter edit truly triggered something in me lol #im glad tho because look it made me write this #sterek #eternalsterek #my writing #personal

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